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argentumcor · 9 months

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Jurassic World Dominion and the Failure to Understand the Themes of Jurassic Park

That's right. Jurassic Park has themes. Crichton has been accused of constantly rewriting Frankenstein, which isn't quite true- State of Fear is not that; I recommend that book if you're in the mood for something that makes fun of the spirit of our age in a delightfully mean way. The movies changed a lot but they maintained his core themes pretty well- until Dominion, Fallen Kingdom's, uh, narrative incoherence aside (should have been about Owen, not Claire again).

What are the themes of Jurassic Park? In no particular order and probably not exhaustive:

Science cannot solve every problem.

Man is very bad at being God and when we try, people die horribly.

Humanity is not capable of understanding, let alone controlling, complex systems, and needs to respect these facts.

Nature is mean.

Materialism has made for a really shitty ethics system, to say the least.

You can quibble, but Crichton and the JP movies aren't subtle. It was brilliant to make Ian Malcom so much to take personally, and someone who likes to say "I told you so" too much to take action, because he is right a lot but is clearly not an author's pet and has the moral flaw of not acting before bad things happen.

Jurassic World has a lot of flaws as a follow-up, but it imperfectly maintains these themes until Dominion, where it precedes to blow them up. The owners of Jurassic World can't help to keep dabbling in forces they can't understand and the raptors are still dangerous and smart and not something to toy with. It doesn't take a lot for the park to go to hell really fast.

The first part of Fallen Kingdom is dumb. Claire is not the sort of character who would go off to care about "dinosaur rights", which was deeply stupid, and all her big and pretty well executed character development happened in the first movie. It should have been Owen's story, with them being together and him getting talked into going back to get the dinosaur he has an emotional connection with.

The part with the little girl, Maisie, is more interesting and fits the themes better. It comes to light she is a clone of old man Lockwood's daughter, who passed away young, and that Hammond split off from Lockwood (no relation to the young handsome ghost hunter hero) because he saw this as an abomination. Which it is. Maisie herself is not an abomination- she's a person- but her conception was.

Maisie was created as an object. Her 'grandfather' wanted to defy death and bring his daughter back to life. He did not want Maisie; he wanted his daughter. That he might have grown to love Maisie as herself does not negate what his goal was. It's twisted. From the moment of her conception, she was treated as an object- the same as the dinosaurs, hence her sympathy for them (Owen and Claire still should have told her letting them out was really stupid and wrong, because it was; people died). The process to create Maisie and the Indoraptor showed no respect for the natural order.

Now we come to Dominion.

Humanity has been mucking around with forces beyond its ken again, using a materialistic ethical framework that has gone badly wrong again and is going to get worse. Locusts, you imbeciles...the people who advised the use of fucking locusts must have been the products of a post-modern educational system.

Of course, Dr. Wu in his newfound and much, much belated ethical torment concludes he can fix this mistake of genetic manipulation with even more genetic manipulation. Super easy, barely an inconvenience (seriously, it was harder to flip the circuit breakers in Jurassic Park than sort out this locust mess).

Do you know how they sorted out Jurassic Park's mistakes of genetic manipulation in the book? They firebombed it. Because its creation was hubris of the highest order and its hazard was incalculable. It needed to be eradicated. And it still didn't solve the problem, because the raptors got off the island (and started spreading a mysterious disease). Science cannot solve every problem. Indeed, humanity cannot solve every problem. Some things are beyond our control, no matter how much we try.

My theory is that in 2022, the themes of Jurassic Park were...disallowed by the Hollywood zeitgeist for multiple reasons. The very big one, occurring during filming, was the pandemic. To say that something like a plague of locusts could not be solved by science would be...a message that would not be allowed. I have no idea if there were rewrites. Also it is long disallowed to find materialistic ethics systems wanting, though these days I feel entertainment dares to dabble in the shallow end of that.

The thing that really gets me about Dominion is the retcon of Maisie's origin, or rather the motives for her origin. Her mother (genetic twin sister) had her made...to be able to give herself a second try after her genetic disease killed her? To experience being pregnant before she died? To claim she was a mother (notice no man at all in the picture, so the kid would have no parents)? As a genetic experiment about super extra special gene modification?

None of this is better than the original version of Maisie's conception, but it is framed in an intensely sentimental fashion. Maisie is the product of something twisted, she was made as an object for someone and not a person, a child, and this should bother her. Her learning to live with that being the reason people had her made is more interesting than her learning oh, the woman she is the clone of was her mother and wanted her to go out and truly live and now she's just okay with this.

I think Crichton would have really enjoyed exploring a character with this problem. It's common in super soldier narratives and such, so it isn't wholly unexplored. Dominion just opted skip out on the...casual cruelty of Maisie's conception. The fact that it was mankind acting like it was God, with the best of intentions, and treating a human being as an object to be used for its own ends (legacy, betterment of mankind, vague and unfulfillable desire to be a mother because she would be dead, pick your motive) from the moment she was conceived is just glossed over with weepy girl-power sentiment.

This all neglects the bad pacing and other issues with Dominion. It's just such a post-modern movie, where before the franchise hewed to a pre-modern morality. It makes me mad because Jurassic Park said something important about science and humanity's role in the world. Dominion offers sentimental "mankind can do anything" mush that isn't true and hurts more than it helps.

As a species, we are capable of amazing things. But we are not God. Life and death are not ours to command. We cannot fix all problems we face. These are not simply moral opinions, these are laws of the universe with perhaps greater rigidity than that of gravity. Humility in the face of this benefits us far more than charging in to muck about with nature as if we can control it utterly- or to batter other about as if- if they would just do x, y, and z- everything would be perfect. It also prepares us for the bitter shocks of life, because we understand that we simply cannot control or even understand so many things.

#jurassic world #moral imagination #jurassic park #materialistic ethics fail

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abhorrenttheorizer · 8 months

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Ok so uhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh

Been a while since I made some TGSquid content

I'm trying to find some sort of a balance between quantity and quality but there's issues. I don't want to post something actually worthwhile once every 5 years, but I also don't want to post a bunch of shitty sketches and unfinished things that don't look good.

Hopefully the image below isn't too bright for people who use 100% brightness settings but just in case I am going to spoiler for photosensitivity reasons

This issue is made worse by the fact that I seem to only be good at rendering now. My cartooning or "flat sketch" quality is in the shitter, but bear with me on this one.

TL;DR: I have turned Rythulians into furries and also there's more of them:

Sooooooo rythulian history and development because why not. In order of most ancient to most recent from left to right.

Also heavy crossover material because you can pry the idea that Journey and Sky are connected and they're all the same species/in the same evolutionary tree out of my cold dead... brain?

And so begins a small sketch of what repeated divine punishment does to a motherfucker. Why? Idk but tbh I like the idea that Megabird is a corrupt, unforgiving, wrathful deity that regularly punishes her devoted children. That idea unironically won't stop pestering me but I'll talk about Megabird and my thoughts on her later.

Rythulian evolution is all kinds of fucked up because of the heavy divine hand (wing?) at play in their development, with new traits suddenly and randomly being added instantly when they should take millions of years to develop. In the beginning, Rythulians were once tall, lumbering, bony creatures that lived in lowland forests and plains areas. This species was extant from several thousand years before the start of their civilization, to a few hundred years before the start of Journey (2012). At this point in time they were more closely related to "dark creatures" in their surrounding areas than "light creatures", hence the lack of glowiness. While not true vertebrates, ancestral Rythulians had an internal shell in the chest region with segments similar to those of ribcages, and a heavy keel at the center to protect the wax gland. They also had long segmented attachments to the internal shell that acted like a spine, fused in the lumbar region which made them relatively inflexible. They also only had one fur and one eye color, dark blue with bluish green eyes, with little to no variation in fur pattern or color. Because they lacked the internal magic that would grant them the ability to stand on itty bitty Barbie feet, the feet of ancestral Rythulians were thick and camel-esque, made to hold their great size and weight against soft forest soil. At this point in time, Rythulians did not need to perform yearly death rituals, only ascending the mountain for rebirth for the sake of cleansing the body and spirit.

Cue massive war over resources forcing their evolution into the 2nd figure in the image.

Nicknamed the "Atonement species" by their far descendants, the next iteration of Rythulians were small(er), soft, jelly things with bright white beads where green eyes once were. Smooth, sloping torso that used to be their arms now void and featureless, like the duney wastelands they were commanded to die in. Despite having very slug-like anatomy, they do not leave a moist trail when they move. However, what separates this slug from the slugs of some other reprimands of a higher power, is that the Atonement Rythulians do have mouths, and boy did they love screaming. Atonement Rythulians existed from a few years before the start of Journey (2012) to several hundred years before the development of the first settlements on the other size of the Mountain of Eden. Unlike their previous ancestors, this species had no bones at all besides the skull and internal shell, a trait that will continue on in the rest of their descendants. Their feet are significantly smaller as well, and all digits posess retractable hooves. On the lower belly is a pouch of loose, stretchy skin that will continue in all future descendants, something that protects them from the impacts of guardians and enabling them to stretch up to 6x their height, As well as the relative bonelessness, they were created in the image of Light, and thus had Light's magic, rather than their naturally evolved Dark ancestors. They lacked arms because of divine punishment, it was arms that aided the ancient Rythulians in their pillage and plundering and war, and it was arms that were taken away, forcing generation after generation of slugbirb to maneuver their environments with only their legs and their song for dexterity. Also unlike the ancestral Rythulian, this species came in a wide variety of facial disc colors, another trait passed down to their descendants.

Cue the start of divine corruption, a goddess rendering thousand of years of armless infrastructural development obsolete for supposed shits and giggles.

The "Sanctioned" or "Spirit" Rythulians differed not much from their previous ancestors, other than for their Good Deeds, they were finally granted their arm privileges back, in the form of massive hulking bear paws. This species originated several thousands of years after the events of Journey (2012), and was extant up until the Eden disaster before the events of Sky: Children of the Light. Under their new powerlifter arms, they have a small flap of skin from the upper arm to the waist, used to aid them in flight, giving them added endurance against their predecessors. Along with the retractable hooves in the feet, the hands have retractable claws as well.

Cue even more war over technology, followed by even more divine punishment, followed by even more divine corruption.

Finally, the latest iteration of Rythulians, with many traits that are far more adapted to flight than the previous forms. Some of these traits are to bring them closer to other flying light creatures, such as their long, tentacle-esque tails used for steering much like the tails of mantas, and others are simply to make flight easier, suck as their longer membranes that start from the elbow and reach down to the hip, which help with endurance flying. Modern Rythulians have been extant since the first of their kind, the descension of Prince Alef/King Resh, to the present day. This iteration practices complete metamorphosis, with a waxy, almost carapaced "larval" stage (the skykid, or moth), and the softbodied, "feathery" secondary form (secondary instead of adult, since they metamorphosize into the softbodied form well before they are mature, around the age of 10). This species also must sacrifice themselves every "birthday" that individuals may have simply to age properly, whereas such rituals weren't necessary for their predecessors.

Thanks for reading! Hopefully my posting will be a little more regular as I balance school, work, and shitposting on this.... site xd

#brainlet hour #speculative biology #exobiology #xenobiology #journey game #rythulian headcanons #journey headcanons #thatgamecompany

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drawawyvern · 4 years

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so softened and tender / so lost and young / and I don’t know where I’m going

#hi emo art time #normally art is only therapy because stress relief #now it's a little more direct #this was really quick i really just wanted to get it out there #and i am still figuring out csp and how to paint in it #hence the sort of shitty use of materials #but hey! a calligraphy brush!#that was pretty easy to use!#and looks great!#i love typography so damn muchhhhh #i think this is one of two things i have posted that is entirely digital at every stage wow #and i forgot to put blue highlights on her coat #and i completely forgot to add her hands until i'd already opened the thing to make a new post #so whoops #all good now though #drawawyvern #Natasha Rostova #Natasha Pierre and the Great Comet of 1812 #i was gonna do pippa but i haven't drawn her i don't know her face as well i'd have had to find references and stuff........#this was a quick project #if he were here now #denee benton #anyway the point was atmosphere and general mood of how she stands and text #so mission accomplished #funny detail: i did the o in love like how you'd do it in russian calligraphy not english #which i would have gone back and fixed except it looked good and it's set in russia so that's forgivable #i did it completely by accident i just have done way more russian calligraphy recently than english and muscle memory #war and peace

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earthstellar · 3 years

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Transformers Analysis: Folklore and Folk Magic in the Mines of Kaon

thinking about Miner Megatron again, as always. here we goooo

So I've been doing some folk magic, as I usually do, and it got me thinking:

Surely, the lower class/caste bots wouldn’t feel welcomed into the more organised Cybertronian temples etc., or might even be outright banned from joining in shared spiritual spaces or rituals.

So it’s time to teach y’all some working class magic history and how we can apply that to Cybertronian spirituality:

Working Class History: Casting Spells on the Job (Just Call it Prayer so the Boss Doesn't Find Out)

Here's a quick history of rural Appalachian folk magic, for some context:

1) The Christian Bible has been used for spellcasting all up and down the rural East Coast in the USA from day one of colonisation.

In Pennsylvania you have Hexenmeisters and the Pennsylvania Dutch practices, for a well-documented example.

2) The working class has done spellcasting with the Bible from the very first day shitty bosses started

This is for several reasons, but primarily because Bibles were common and cheap, you didn't have to know how to read in order to follow along with or change the lyrics of popular hymns and prayers to fit your own needs, and it was very easy to sneak what is essentially localised witchcraft under the radar when it just looks like you're reading the Bible to everyone else.

Catholic materials were used a lot for this, because they were often provided for free by any local churches, and a lot of working class people in Appalachia were Italian (Roman Catholic) or Eastern European (Eastern Orthodox Catholic), which meant there was no shortage of all sorts of votive candles and the like to utilise for what we would now identify as spellcasting.

It's important to note that it wasn't called spellcasting outright by anybody; Sometimes it was called "hexing" or "sweet talking", among other terms, but if you called it spellcasting it was heavily frowned upon.

A lot of people were uncomfortable (and are still uncomfortable) with verbalising it or identifying it as such due to stigma from the more mainstream religious communities or their own religious backgrounds, and of course, historically if the boss found out that all the workers hated their jobs so much they were doing fucking witchcraft about it, it would not have ended well for the workers.

So, stealth it is. And that's why there are so many specific folk practices in a lot of historically working class rural regions/communities-- Not just in Appalachia, but similar things happen in similar communities around the world.

What does this have to do with Megatron?

Everything we know about the lower classes on Cybertron, the lower caste members, and the mines/industrial regions in Tarn and Kaon suggest that a similar folklore likely existed within these working communities.

And any local folk practices likely developed for the exact same reasons that this type of folk practice developed in the real world:

Workers are fucking miserable, "mainstream" religion isn't satisfying their spiritual/emotional/social/material needs or concerns, and close-knit people in small communities spending most of their time together naturally start to sort of do their own thing based on their collective situation.

People get desperate, there's nowhere to turn and nothing to do, so spirituality becomes a lifeline in that it builds solidarity and creates a more appropriate sort of support system.

For example: If we aren't allowed time off work to mourn our friend who was killed by heavy machinery, and we aren't allowed any time to process that or deal with it or take care of each other, then we will invent a ritual that allows us to grieve on the job.

This was, and still is, a common thing.

Which brings us to...

St. Barbara and the Mines + Solus Prime

St. Barbara's backstory can be summarised, roughly, as such (based on the version of this story that I know; keep in mind the details can vary):

She was kept isolated from others by her father, who became furious that she refused an arranged marriage. When she fled, he chased her; She ran into two people working in a field, the first who helped her, and the second who gave her path away to her father.

She was captured, and brought to a prominent local figure (the title varies based on different versions of this story), who had her tortured for escaping and disobeying her father.

However, when imprisoned, they tried to kill her again and again, and every morning she was healed. Fire intended to be used to burn her would cool the second it got near her skin, and daggers used to cut her would go dull when brought near her.

Snakes thrown into her room intended to bite her would then die the instant they went to approach her, and ropes intended to be used to bind and choke her would spontaneously fray and snap before they could be tied.

Eventually, she was condemned to beheading, and a special sword was used to cut her head off, which finally killed her.

Her father is the one who beheaded her, and as divine punishment, he was hit by lightning-- A single bolt that lasted so long that his entire body went up into flames, and his ashes disappeared.

Her gravesite became a place of veneration, where people prayed for protection and safety.

She became known as the patron saint of all people with dangerous jobs or jobs where the bosses don't care about the worker's wellbeing or safety, for obvious reasons: Nothing but the hands of her own father could ever harm her.

(The imagery of St. Barbara being slain only by a special sword is very reminiscent of Solus Prime being slain only by a special sword...)

Workers, especially those with particularly dangerous or shitty jobs but also just anyone working class in general, can interpret this story in several ways which can make it additionally relatable:

Her father = A controlling and aggressive boss who abuses or neglects their workers to death.

The field workers = A pro-union worker (a helper) and an anti-union worker or scab (a betrayer).

So you can see how St. Barbara became immediately adopted as a common worker's saint, and was used in a lot of regional working class folk magic practices (where such folk magic developed within local working communities).

And this is still going strong as a tradition; Crossrail tunnel borers in London consecrated the drilling site in the name of St. Barbara in 2013:

"Several hundred contractors and senior management attended the St Barbara's Day ceremony at the Thames Tunnel (pictured) which will link Plumstead and North Woolwich when completed. The site was so large, that sound engineers put in place an amplification system for the ceremony." - Article here.

"As a long-standing tradition, one of the first tasks for each new tunnelling projects is to establish a small shrine to Santa Barbara at the tunnel portal or at the underground junction into long tunnel headings. This is often followed with a dedication and an invocation to Santa Barbara for protection of all who work on the project during the construction period." - Article here.

And here's a related example of a worker's prayer for St. Barbara, from here:

So this is very much a tradition that is still going strong, and it isn't just Catholic workers who engage with these types of things!

To accommodate more diverse groups and communities of workers, folk practices (including what eventually becomes folk magic) increasingly develop even further away from any one specific religious origin, in order to become more inclusive for the majority of people who can be from all kinds of different spiritual or cultural backgrounds.

Hence, more folk magic is made-- And I believe something like this could absolutely have evolved in a similar way in working communities on Cybertron.

Cybertronian Spirituality: The Primes, The Knights, The Titans

My personal theory/headcanon, and there is not much in canon to support this particularly so please keep that in mind, is that given the average type of manual labour working environment in Tarn and Kaon (dangerous, dark, and deep), it would make sense for the legendary Titans to become worked into some kind of folk practice.

We have this concept of the Titans as these giant and very particular beings, which reminds me somewhat of the Jewish Golem of Prague, in that the Titans are made from raw materials in some kind of mystical or cosmically spiritual manner, then eventually ally themselves to at least one respective Prime who then acts as a director of their actions to achieve victory over cosmic evil(s).

The Titans then go forward and act as guardians of Cybertronian life by combating the origins of these cosmic evil(s) as protectors of their respective polities and regions and eventually colony worlds, called into action by what is essentially a metaphysical and possibly outright spiritual pull of the need of their Prime(s) and later on the needs of the Cybertronian and colony world populations in times of threat or desperation.

These details are peppered throughout canon and vary based on media/franchise, but most recently Titan lore was covered again in IDW’s Optimus Prime series, issue 10, literally titled Origin Myths.

What is interesting is that while the Golem association could be reasonably made, you could also reasonably say that the Three Original Titans (Metroplex, Chela, and Metrotitan) could be associated just as easily with the Catholic concept of the Holy Trinity.

Lots of different interpretations could be applied to this stuff!

Class Stratification Within Cybertronian Religious Institutions

No matter how you may interpret it, we know that the Titans have a similar mystical presence in Cybertronian history and cultural lore to that of the Primes and Knights, and it would make sense for those spurned and disparaged by "mainstream" spiritual practices (which were likely just as stratified by class and caste as everything else was on Cybertron during Megatron's youth) to go ahead and create a folk practice based more around Titans.

This is because the Primes would like be associated directly with their oppressive rulers and upper classes, and the Knights, who are said to be the first Cybertronians to come from the Well, thusly represent a very high class onto their own which may have repelled working class bots who were very likely sick of essentially worshipping those venerated in their class stratified society solely due to the conditions of their creation; The Knights were "born with silver spoons", essentially, and it's hard to sell that to people who suffered due to the conditions of their own creation.

Therefore, the Titans are the other most likely Cybertronian figures of historical lore that could reasonably be adapted into a sort of folk religion for the working classes and lower social caste bots.

The imagery is strong, and relatable: In Megatron's case, the manual labourers and miners all have large frames compared to the average Cybertronian, they all toil invisibly and in relative silence, and they are kept away from the end products of their labour and yet without them, Cybertron planet wide would instantly struggle to sustain their raw material demands.

They are critical workers, yet many of them have no names/designations; It is noted at least once in canon that some Titans are so old or so little known that their designations are not recorded. Yet without these unseen/unknown Titans, it could be the case that cosmic evil could have achieved victory.

While the Titans are critical, they are largely a mystery and unknown in any real detail. They do not normally engage with average Cybertronians, and when they do, it is usually indirectly-- Even though their actions actively impact the lives of nearly everyone.

And though the Primes and Knights are generally never physically present, at least not within living memory, there is real and physical proof of Titans. I feel like that aspect alone may well appeal more to people who are very physically oriented; We also see a stark realist mentality from many of the lower class/caste bots, who are sometimes realistic to the point of nihilism (which is part of why Megatron's writings were so revolutionary, in that they re-introduced hope to people who had previously concluded that there was no realistic possibility of ever rising up).

The Titans being a known, tangible physical reality may well have endeared them as a more interesting folkloric or spiritual focus to this particular cohort of bots.

Just like with St. Barbara in real life, you can see how the Titans may have been interpreted in certain ways by the lower class/caste working bots which may have made them more appealing or more easy to structure into a framework of sorts for their own practices within their local cultures.

A Little Meta: There's a Lot of Various Religious Imagery in Transformers

Like with all media, especially Western media, inevitably some Jesus sneaks in there.

Which usually sucks, because it can be alienating for literally anyone who isn't familiar with Christianity in some way (as some references or parallels are inevitably not going to be as obvious or even detectable at all to people who didn't grow up with all this sometimes very specific shit, resulting in missed thematic elements and so on due to no fault of the viewers but rather the tendency for Western shows to overwhelmingly be written and designed by primarily Western white middle aged cis straight men who tend to throw some Jesus in there when there should not necessarily be any Jesus in there, but I could yell about this all night).

Transformers as a franchise altogether is not immune to this; As with all media, it is made by people, and people are influenced by their social/cultural upbringing, and that includes religious influences.

We could read some of this into the TFP/Aligned Continuity, in regards to the idea of the Thirteen Primes and how that concept is interpreted in TFP.

Transformers Prime: Alpha Trion is Essentially Paul the Apostle

The TFP Primes resemble both the Apostles as well as various Saints, and especially the Fourteen Holy Helpers; These fourteen Saints in particular are elevated above the others in many cases and contexts-- Similar to how the Primes are held up as elevated over other Cybertronians and other figures in Cybertronian history and presumably within certain Cybertronian spiritual practices as well.

For example, Alpha Trion is strongly reminiscent of the Christian figure Paul the Apostle, who was a writer/scribe known for documenting early Christian concerns of faith in his letters, which became extremely important to theological historians in regards to determining early Christian discourse and attempting to create a timeline of early Christianity.

His letters are included the New Testament in thirteen (!) sections called epistles, which are archived forever in various iterations within the Christian Bible.

Now, let’s take a look at the symbolism, using the TFP main illustration of Alpha Trion as featured in the Covenant, and a popular Icon image of Paul the Apostle:

Beard, cloak, book-- Even the pose they are in here is very similar, look at the feet and the way they are both standing. Even the halo of Cybertronian glyphs around Alpha Trion’s head resembles the gold filament of Paul’s halo.

And much like Alpha Trion's questionable ability to write/re-write history and determine events through some kind of cosmically divine power of foresight, the timeline of Paul's letters will likely never be fully verifiable, and of course, there are so many translations and interpretations of these letters along with the rest of the New Testament that while key points remain fairly consistent, there is still no "true" version or exact outline of events or discussions as recorded by Paul-- Primarily because in at least a few cases, Paul's letters are the only allusion to certain events or conversations.

This is extremely similar to how Alpha Trion states outright in the Covenant that he himself doesn't know if what he writes is actually factual anymore, or if he has changed things so many times to try to construct a more favourable narrative of actions and events that reality itself may have been warped by his Quill, either forwards or backwards in time...

You could also argue that Alpha Trion is presented as a God-like figure in TFP (especially when he appears to Optimus in the form of an echoing voice and shimmering spectral figure in a vision caused by what is essentially the equivalent of a holy relic), and Orion Pax would then be comparable to Jesus pre-Crucifixion, with his reformatting into Optimus Prime post-Matrix heavily resembling Jesus in the eyes of his followers post-Resurrection.

The main cast of Autobots in this comparison would then roughly correspond to the Apostles, of whom there were twelve, with Optimus then making Thirteen... And of course, canonically, Optimus is the resurrection of the Thirteenth Prime.

You can also see visual similarities in the depiction of Thirteen in the Covenant; It reminds me heavily of the Divine Mercy image of Jesus:

Both have their right hands raised, their chests emitting a holy/cosmic light.

I'm just saying, it is totally possible to make connections between fictional lore/spiritual figures and real world ones, and TF is loaded with content that can be re-contextualised in this way.

(I also want to point out at this time that it is not my intention to offend anyone with any of this analysis; I am writing from the point of view of someone who grew up with folk spirituality, and I am also a Quaker Attender, just so you are aware of my own personal background. I would love to hear any other interpretations of any spiritual imagery in Transformers media, because there’s a ton of possible ways to read into this stuff!)

In Conclusion: Cast a Hex on Your Boss by Calling Upon the Titans

Just for fun, as someone who has actually done folk magic for my entire life, I've adapted a hex against bad bosses to fit this headcanon. I think this is something that lower class/caste bots would absolutely engage in; It's common in real life as well.

The original I'm basing this off of was actually something I found in one of our old family Bibles before I moved out, and was written in Girard, Pennsylvania sometime between 1920-1930. I believe it was written by a relative of mine who worked either on the farm or on the railways.

Remember that folk magic like this is for and by working class people, so there are no fancy supplies needed; Don't ever buy shit to do magic, you can do it with anything laying around you. No need to spend money.

If you have a shitty boss, please let me know if you hex your boss with this. I always encourage witchcraft, fictional or otherwise.

Here's what you do, if you want to actually try this:

1) Using any old paper that you have lying around, cut it roughly into a square (doesn't need to be perfect.) It doesn't matter what type of paper it is.

2) Grab any pen you like, it can be any type of pen, any type of ink.

3) Draw a square outline on the paper, making a border on the page. This can be big or small as you like, and you can decorate it if you want; Just leave enough space to write inside the square.

4) Fold this paper into a square, any way you'd like as long as it's a square, and take this paper while it's still blank to work in your pocket.

Carry the paper with you for at least one full day at work. If you can, place it in a chest pocket or a pocket where the paper will be fairly close to your body.

It doesn't matter if the paper gets dirty or smudged or torn; In fact, that's even better.

(Some people who do variations of this spell in real life even use the paper to wipe dirt off their hands etc. throughout the day, to really get the energy of a work day settled into the paper. As long as it can still be written on, you can do this if you'd like.)

5) At the end of the work day, take the paper out, and write the following:

Where I have put [X], the word "Lord" was in the original version of this hex which was in my family Bible, but to contextualise it within the fictional headcanon lore here, you can replace this with the word "Titan". (Or you can replace it with anything else that may be appropriate as well, if you would like to actually use this hex!)

"Give us pay for our work, or the poor will plea to the [X] against you, and you will be struck down, cast down.

If you do not give to those who give to you, you will be cursed coming in, and going out.

Just as the [X] can raise you up and lead you to prosper, so too can the [X] turn away from you, and you will be left to have your walls destroyed, your fortress ruined.

Us servants will rejoice, but you will cry out in anguish, you will be put to shame.

Without the toilers, the land is made desolate, the haunt of jackals.

[X], turn your gaze to us, we labourers of all kinds, see our tears and our sweat.

Lay curses upon those who use their hands to hold us down; Kept below water, our tears lost in the flood.

Raise the waters, and surge the shores of their ill-owned kingdom; Bring forth to their memory that the [X] stewards the land, and that all among the land are equal in spirit.

The [X] will cast fury upon the unrighteous and conniving, cast rage and stand among us mightily, each motion casting winds against the oppressor who weakens like fractured stone under the onslaught of rain.

The [X] will make a storm from our anguish, which brings us higher, raises us from desolation. Our tears, become the rain that withers the false tower looming high above us.

Our hands will raise from our tools and duties, and offer high praise to the [X], who guards the disparaged and lowly, who enacts justice against those who have done wrong against us.

Let us be brought high, and those who revel in our struggle, may they be cast down."

6) You may flip the paper over once the ink is dry, and on the back, put three Xs in the upper corners of the paper. You may also add three more XXXs to the centre of the paper, where the crease in the paper is from folding it.

7) Re-fold the paper, and put it in the bottom of your right shoe. If this is too uncomfortable, carry it in any pocket on your right side.

You can also place it in your wallet for safe keeping, as your wallet contains money and possibly a work ID or something similar, which are all tied to work and working.

And there you have it! Fuck shitty bosses, both fictional ones and real ones. Join a union, do some witchcraft.

This post was long as always, but I hope it's interesting to someone out there! <3 Thank you to anyone who actually reads through all of this! <3

#megatron #transformers #tfp #transformers prime #alpha trion #transformers meta #transformers analysis #long post #idw transformers #idw 1 #miner megatron #young megatron #maccadam #tw religion #working class history #witchcraft #spellcasting #hexing #solus prime

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peralta-guaranteed · 3 years

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any hc’s after what happened after amy told jake about her past in 6x8?

This started out as only HCs because oh man is it a heavy topic, but then the blocks phased into each other... so now I guess it's some Jake Introspection drabble.

He obviously doesn't let anything show while he's still with Amy, getting her a change of clothes and that brush (that she does use), working further on the case and driving her home (she's far too tired to drive them like she usually does, and almost falls asleep in the passenger seat too if he didn't keep her awake with the most idle of chatter he could think of). He wants to be supportive and not pull her into another discussion or question-round, she doesn't need that on her shoulders and it's not her job to help him through this. But it's swirling through his head. So many more thoughts and questions and memories he needs to sort through.

Hence, this whole 'can't sleep so I'll watch tv' situation. It usually works quite well to distract him, and Amy has often found him snoring on the couch in the morning during a particularly difficult case, or after a fight with his mom. But today he can't even find a show he wants to watch, because his brain can't concentrate on anything on the screen.

Amy conked out almost immediately after they got home and had some sort of dinner, and he tucked her in and whispered to her sleeping face how much he loves her and how they're gonna fix this case, at least, and then he was left alone with his thoughts. Which is never a good thing. He's alternating between worry, sadness and frankly, rage. He wants to go back to her old precinct, find that asshole and, I don't know, shoot him? Probably not he's a cop he shouldn't, and even if he wasn't a cop he shouldn't shoot people, but he could hurt him somehow, right? He could take Rosa and Rosa would- wait, Rosa, does Rosa have a story like that too? She probably has, every woman seems to have one. Who the fuck hurt Rosa?! He's gonna find them too and-

He drops onto the couch with a deep sigh, staring at the ceiling the same way he did while lying awake in bed. The whole inevitability and pervasiveness of it all makes him feel... helpless? If that's how he feels, how must the women in his life feel, the ones this actually happened to? (For a brief second, the memory of The Vulture constantly slapping his butt flashes into his mind. The comments he's made about his 'tight, pasty ass' and 'lips that would work better on a good bad girl'. But this isn't about him, and he shouldn't make it about him, and he's being a dick again.) A few weeks later, when another round of 'can't sleep' doesn't lead him to the couch and tv, but rather to a little talk in the dark with Amy, she assures him that if he feels like it is about him, too - it might actually be. But he's not at that point yet, lying on the couch and staring at the ceiling, still faced with the many realisations he's had today about the shittiness of the world. No matter which direction he thinks about it, he always ends up at the realisation that something probably happened in every place he knows to every woman he knows, and how blind he's been about it all. Even if he, obviously, never did anything, he also wasn't supportive or looking out for it and trying to make it better-

Aaaand then he remembers the way they treated Amy when she came to the 99, many years ago. He remembers Charles yucky Wedding Bells comment. He remembers the first of many, many Title Of Your Sextape jokes, and how she'd twitched at it. He remembers digs about both Amy's dates and her un-date-ability from everyone trying to rile up the stuffy new detective. He remembers remarks and jokes about her eagerness to rise in the ranks. He remembers himself doing most of this. So he concludes that, yeah, he did do that shit. He's one of them, in a way. Maybe not in the top ranks, but definitely part of the team.

That brick hits him right in the chest, and he's this close to punching something - preferably himself, but he doesn't know how that would work, Fight Club never really explained it - but he grabs the TV remote instead and types into the Netflix search bar.

He doesn't just watch one Netflix documentary about it all, he watches a t least 3 shows. (It's another shock to see how much material about it there is if you figure out how to look, what a constant topic it already is, how he's barely ever heard anything more indepth about it.) He reads through online articles while watching, going into forums on how to be better, how to be a male ally and not play the White Knight, terms he's heard before, but never bothered to learn the actual definition of.

He's had about 6 cups of coffee when Amy wakes up with her alarms, so she doesn't really notice he hasn't been sleeping. She looks so cute with her still messy hair and tired face with pillow crease lines on it, he wants to hug her and kiss her good morning but is that okay? Right now? After everything?

He gives her an awkward wave from the couch instead, and watches her make her own coffee, and then pitterpatters over to lean against the cabinets when she sits down at the kitchen table. Always at a safe distance. Always not intruding or mentioning something that could hurt or bother her in her few moments 'off' of that case. Always going through the points he's learned now in his head, on how to be there, but not too overbearing, on how to not lead the conversation, but listen.

"Do I not get a morning kiss?" is the conversation she starts, though, because she always gets one ever since he moved in, morning breath and all. It's her favourite part of 'waking up with Jake Peralta in her bed', and today she didn't even get the main part of that list because he wasn't there, and she could hear the TV in the living room, and not even 6 cups of coffee can fool Amy Santiago. She knows he's been awake.

"Wasn't really sure if you- if it's okay-" he mumbles into his 7th cup of coffee.

"Jake, come over here and kiss your wife, please."

He kneels down next to her chair to give her the softest little morning kiss she's ever gotten, and she holds onto his face with one hand so he doesn't just up and leave again.

"You're okay, Jake. You're okay, whatever you do, so don't go second-guessing every touch now, please." She plays with his hair before looking at him again and god, those scared chocolate puppy-eyes are always killing her. "And even if you were not okay at some point, I wouldn't ever be afraid to tell you, and I know that you'd stop immediately."

He smiles at that, very tentatively, and the next kiss she gets is just as timid, but she gets it at least. And then she gets pulled into a bear hug too, while he's still kneeling in front of her, her legs bracketing him in as he buries his face in her shoulder.

"I love you so much, Ames. We're gonna fight this case so hard." She hears against her t-shirt as she leans her head against his.

"Tomorrow I'd like to wake up next to my awesome, supportive husband again. I kinda need him around."

He looks up at her and nods with fervor, and then finally kisses her the way she's used to.

(Two hours later, when he tells Rosa exactly what documentary kept him up and out of their bed that night, she feels something little but bright bloom in her chest, right under the garden of flowers he's already had growing in her heart. He's rooted there, right in her ribcage, and she's never letting him out again.)

#b99 #brooklyn 99 #jake peralta #amy santiago #peraltiago #ficlet #my writing #he said she said #trying to end this on a slightly positive note was difficult I tell ya

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felassanis · 4 years

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Characters that I think will make a return in Dragon Age 4

Okay, So lets get the first two out of the way and the reasons why I think they are bound to return.

Dorian Pavus: Pretty much a given, he’s already in Tevinter. He’s got big plans for the city and he’s a fan favourite. it would be a crime if he didnt come back.

Fenris: Will the Blue Wraith release I can’t help but wonder if that’s setting up Fenris’s arc and how it’ll pertain to DA4. How this wonderful character will tie into the shitstorm that’s about to occur in the next installment. When you hear Tevinter, chances are a couple of things will come to mind. Mages, blood-magic, Dorian, Slavery and Fenris. His whole character is linked to this setting. Hes a character who's got the biggest reasons to be there so he better be there. either as the leader of a slave rebellion or possibly an agent of Fen’harel. Also, given how vocal the fandom has been about him coming back, I think Bioware will deliver. I just hope he’s intertwined witht the plot like Varric was, and not given a crappy cameo like Zevran was in dragon age 2. And even if you did (You fucking monster) Give him back to Danarius, then he’ll be in Tevinter too. Or if you killed him like a fucking moron, well Bioware have brought back characters from the dead before. Leliana I'm looking at you

And ngl, I really want a FenHawke moment

Now, these next ones are the “Realistic” few who I think will make a return based on theories and evidence but I’m also making a section of characters who I want to see come back even if it’s not likely:

Sten: I find it very likely we will see this guy again. There conflict between Tevinter and Seheron should be one of the focuses in dragon age 4 and given that our actions in dragon age 2 he becomes the Arishok and if memory serves; he’s in Seheron. More Sten? More likely than you think if I’m right.

Talis: Another one who should make an appearance given her allegiance to the Qunari. Talis was a really good character and criminally underused in Mark of the Assasins and dragon age 2 as a whole. I think she’ll make a cameo, doing her thing as a skilled assassin for the Qunari.

Krem: It would be interesting for this character to make a return, perhaps he could not stand to see what is happening in his home country and makes a return. Given how important Krem is for representation, him being from Tevinter and how popular he was, I think he will also be making a return.

Verania: A small cameo. But I think if you stopped Fenris from killing her, then his sister Verania will be making a return. Which could offer an interesting scene if Fenris also makes a return. She does return to Tevinter, and given that her master was killed (Hopefully) it would be a curious thing to see how she ended up.

Varric: The reason why I think Varric will come back is because of the Red Idol. Varric has history with that thing, it was him and his brother who made the expedition to recover it from the Deep Roads and given how obvious it is that the Red Idol will play a major role in DA4 I think Varric will feel compelled to try and get it back or destroy it. He hates red lyrium and he hates that idol and he knows exactly what it is capable of, so the thought of it ending up in the wrong hands must unsettle him. He felt at fault for the red lyrium and Corypheus, hence why he stayed with the Inquisition to try and sort it all out. I think it will be the same for the red idol, he feels a responsibility to stop it because he thinks it’s his fault it’s out there in the first place.

Scout Harding: A potential LI maybe??? I think she’ll play a vital role whether or not the inquisition was kept or discarded in Tresspasser. I hope she gets a more important role than a simple quest giver.

Isabela: With the recent concept art I am seeing A LOT of Pirates and I couldn’t help but think of Isabela. And that one concept art seems to confirm Isabela is coming back and I'm so excited.

Leliana & Cassandra: It sounds to me like Leliana and Cassandra will come back as advisors of sorts, I’m not sure what role they’ll play exactly in the grand scheme of things in the next game but I do think they will both come back in some capacity, because of their words and cameo in the ending to Tresspasser.

Abelas: maybe only a cameo if you killed him, but Solas essentially recruits Abelas and if hes alive I think Abelas could make a return.

Unrealistically, but why I think they should:

Zevran: He’s has somehow been mentioned or appeared in every game since origins and I don’t want that streak to be ruined. I think there’s definitely a role for him given how much he adventures and explores, his wit and his tendencies to get into trouble, and how he is a fan favourite.

Oghren: Honestly? Just because we haven’t heard from him a long time.

Cullen: I highly doubt he will come back. Why? Because I feel like the option to romance him in Inquisition on top of his sort of redemption arc in that game is his...end. Like, he got closure, he got the focus he needed regarding all the shit he went through in the past two games and I honestly do believe that is where Cullen’s story ends. But...I could be wrong, they might want to keep the pattern of him appearing in every game and maybe they have something else planned for him since they strangely liked this character because he went from this minor dude in Origins to Meredith’s lackey in dragon age 2 to a fully fledged main cast member in dragon age 3.

Meredith: Speaking of Meredith, I think it would be so neat for her to make a return as a boss fight. Because fighting her in dragon age 2 was so much fun and I think with the return of the Red Lyrium Idol, having her come back somehow would be appropriate. Maybe the statue she turns into merely keeps her in hibernation? So under whatever the hell material the red lyrium used to ‘kill’ her, it actually didn’t snuff out her life but rather preserved it. She’s still alive and fiddling with the Idol brings her back. Edit: turns out shes super dead but I'm leaving it here in case I can somehow rationalise how this scary lady could come back

Orsino: I can totally imagine the theory that Varric lied about Orsino’s death in order to protect him so Cassandra and the Templars wouldn’t go after him. Even the devs said his death was a mistake, so this could be a great way to rectify how shitty a card he was dealt in DA2 and give him a better storyline and role in the next game. Orsino is just a really good character who would do well with more time and focus spent on him.

Bodahn & Sandal: because I need answers about what the fuck Sandal is and I miss Bodahn. And given Sandal's massive fucking foreshadowing to Solas and the magic of the elves I think HE HAS TO COME BACK but also...idk what they would really do with him, if hed really play a role other than what he did in the first and second game. An enigmatic dwarf for comedic effect and also creepiness.

Anders: if hes alive, and if you didnt romance him. I want a cameo, since he was originally supposed to appear in Inquisition as a hermit in a cave. I'd like that concept to return in the area near Tevinter/Antiva. Because I think it would be tragic, if hes borderline insane and a wandering nomad hiding his identity. Maybe Justice has taken over, maybe we have to free him of Justice to recruit Anders. Maybe we need him to enter the Fade somehow? Maybe when the veil is broken Justice takes over completely that way? I just want an Anders cameo, see a tragic ending to a tragic character with the potential of redemption? Potential chance at happiness through helping the player fight Solas? And maybe, if Isabela or Varric come back...theyd have something to say? They might beg the player to help him? Mourn their friend or fret over him? Varric and Anders hug?

Spirit of Wynne: my girl Wynee gets no fucking love or mention from what I've seen and I will not stand for it. I'm sure she died, even by DAII's timeline. But if the veil is torn? Maybe her spirit will pay us a visit, give us words of encourage or wise lessons??? I miss Wynne so much.

Morrigan: I do think something is being set up with her character and Kieran. And with her being so woven with the whole Mythal thing, I wouldn't be shocked if Morrigan wanted to get involved, since Mythal wanted to live on through Morrigan. Maybe Morrigan has a bone to pick, maybe shes mad that Solas killed her mother.

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dramaticwitchbitch · 4 years

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A rant about our education system

One of the things I hate the most about school is that it actively discourages people having actual hobbies that don’t revolve around their life at school. Like yes, if you look at the time we spend in school and the time we spent outside of it, students should have enough time to pursue their own interests. But that isn’t entirely true. First of all, you have homework. This means that after you get home from 7-8 hours of sitting in a classroom, you have to sit back down and do more work. And this is such bullshit. School is all about providing you with the materials to succeed in the adult world, right? Are people generally required to take work home from their workplace and do it in their off time? No. In addition to that, homework, hence the name, has to be completed at home where you can’t easily ask your teacher questions that you could do if it was completed inside the classroom. Back to my original point. Maybe your teachers are kind enough to give you minimal homework. Even then, the majority of students participate in some form of extracurricular. This takes away even more time out of your day and basically is your “free time” for the day. But what if you have other hobbies that aren’t school activities that you want to do? Well, if you can find time among all your other commitments, such as school, extracurricular, homework, chores, a job, religious commitments, or literally anything else you want to do, sometimes once you find that time, you don’t want to do your hobby of choice. Why? Because school is fucking hard. If you’ve ever gone to school you know what I’m talking about. It’s ridiculously draining, from emotional drama, sitting in classes you don’t care about all day, being forced to focus with little to no breaks, shitty cafeteria food, dealing with people you want, friend or relationship problems, and other energy draining activities such as sports or academics. You’ve just dealt with all of that, and you’re ready for a fucking break. An excuse to take a nap, mindlessly watch a TV show or scroll through social media. The last thing on your mind is starting another activity that’s going to take up all your energy, no matter how much you love it. Schools actively discourage hobbies that are unrelated to your school, and do you know why that’s a problem? Let me explain it to you. People figure out what they want to do with their life by experimenting. Trying stuff out. Pursuing new hobbies and activities. And, news flash, a good portion of these are outside of school. But we don’t have time to pursue this hobbies that can teach us life skills and help us discover passions that can develop into careers. Schools discourage these sorts of things with the way their entire system is set up, yet turn around and ask children to make 10 years plans, know what they want to do with their lives and what college they want to go to. Well how are we supposed to know all that if you don’t give us the opportunity to explore, experience the world, discover new things and new interests that can help us develop as people and answer all the questions our counselors ask us that we halfheartedly respond to and pick an option that sounds the least like nails on a chalkboard for the rest of our lives to us. But no, schools would rather our entire lives revolve around their curriculum and we do nothing of interest while we’re under their control. And I think that’s a lot of bullshit.

#rant #school #schools #online school #online learning #asynchronous learning #student #student mental health #students #writing #my writing #essay #ish?#essays #ranting #can you tell im upset?#okay to rb #okay to reblog

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vedj-f-bekuesu · 4 years

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Ninjago Unpopular Opinions

Following on from my watch of the entire old series (combined with already having seen the last two series), I have enough material to work with to make a sort of unpopular opinion list. Some of these are lightweight, some of these are...uh, not so much.

These aren’t in any particular order, this is more of a “I’ll just put them down as I remember them” sort of deal. That’ll be why they appear so messy.

-Even after all this I prefer the newest seasons to the older stuff. There have been a surprising number of good to great older seasons, but I just love that hit of S1/S2 campiness with the more developed writing of later seasons.

-Cole sucked as a leader, aside from in the pilot episodes. In the series proper he varied from complete meathead I hated (first part of S1), to having the same mentoring personality as everyone else (S1 - S2), to being consumed by the love triangle which made him pull a really shitty move (I don’t need to tell you what that refers to). He eventually gets ironed out in season 4, but Lloyd had already taken over as leader at this point. And rightfully so, even if Lloyd’s material got knocked from season 3 as a result.

-I couldn’t really warm up to Ronin that much for some reason. I get the reason why he’s popular, since it was pretty obvious he was supposed to be like an off-beat mentor figure to Nya, but...I dunno, unlike with Dareth, it felt like his skeevy moments were more off-kilter, plus I didn’t really like his arc in Skybound (even if that was written out of reality). That being said, his was strong in Possession even with said moments. Maybe I just need a future appearance to see how I ultimately swing with him.

-I mentioned this in my Hunted overview, but I think Skylor’s just bland. Part of the problem is that she’s mainly just wedged in as an action girl and doesn’t have too many moments to interact outside of that. That’s mostly reserved for moments where she acts as Agony Aunt (which is fine, that shows that being supportive is in her nature), but she needs more to work with. And as an obvious offshoot, if Kailor is the intended endgame it sucks in its current form. They don’t have chemistry or a decent dynamic.

-The other Ninjago ship I don’t particularly like out of all of them is...actually Geode. Yeah, Rebooted obviously wasn’t good for it considering the love triangle, but what actually did more damage to it for me was Skybound. It went so far in trying to oversteer back that it beat you over the head with the fact they were making Cole and Jay best friends after said love triangle (made really obvious when Jay is worried about Cole’s reaction to him seeing Nya in his reflection in both Possession and Skybound, when Cole isn’t even phased when he’s told). It was just really off-putting.

-Jay is a better big brother figure to Lloyd than Kai. Yeah, Kai’s true potential moment in Rise of the Serpentine hinged on realising he (and the others, mind) were supposed to protect Lloyd, they all spent Legacy of the Green Ninja’s first half being Lloyd’s proper mentors, Zane’s death prompted Kai to hover with thoughts of the Green Ninja again (which seemed to me for different reasons to being envious of power at the start, although its handling was very clunky after that), and he had the first episode in Possession which was arguably the strongest showing of a dynamic with Lloyd, but Possession didn’t have much about it outside of said episode, and the show seemed to just forget it from that point beyond some very, very fleeting and sparse bits. In the more modern seasons, it feels like Jay’s stepped up to be more supportive of Lloyd on a more consistent basis (which would make sense with the common fanon that Jay is the youngest of the original Ninja, he’d be closer to Lloyd’s age). It’s something I kind of want tapped into in a proper way at some point.

-Sensei Garmadon is a bit overrated. Just a smidge. When he’s good, he’s good, but most of the time he’s no more interesting than Wu would be in the same position. And I feel like they didn’t really develop his fatherly bond with Lloyd too well despite that being what his character was there for. Again, aside from moments where he was really good.

-Most underrated season of the old batch for me was the last minute shock, March of the Oni. I did enjoy Day of the Departed (which has a worse reputation), but I can understand why someone wouldn’t like it considering how bare it was. March of the Oni is far from my favourite season but I thought it came together really well, so the fact it’s generally panned legitimately confuses me. I guess Hands of Time would be a contender too, but I think opinion on that has swayed in its favour after the new seasons came out (and Secrets of the Forbidden Spinjutsu would be here if I included the new batch) so that’s why it’s edged out.

-Most overrated season for me was undeniably Tournament of Elements. It’s not my least favourite season, but Rebooted and Hunted are pretty maligned to begin with, while Tournament of Elements is usually considered one of the top ones. It starts strong, has an interesting premise and there are ideas that are executed well. The thing is that the elements that people tend to praise the season for are ones I actually think the writers dropped the ball on, hence why this ended up the toughest season to get to the end of, even more than Hunted. It’s a shame, but it’s just not for me.

-Best ninja suits...honestly, I don’t really notice the suits unless they’re really bad, because I’m used to franchises where costume changes mark radical permanent redesigns, and are not just par for the course of the brand (it makes perfect sense with a toy brand who want to sell you the same characters over and over again but still). Not counting the S11 suits since they weren’t part of the old batch, I guess I’d honestly say the ZX suits, maybe? They’re simple, but they’re cute and very distinct. Also Sons of Garmadon Cole channelling the Movie costume was a very good move (and arguably looks even better ripped up in Hunted aethetically), and Kai’s suit was bleh in Sons of Garmadon but its overhaul in Hunted was way better. Also, just as a wildcard, Rebooted Lloyd looks like a more finely tuned ZX suit. Actually, just one last bit on a tangent to note a difference the show makes to the figures that demonstrates the figures’ limitations. For Kai and Jay’s S11 suits, their figures invoke similar feels (because underneath the accessories they do have a lot in common), whereas they feel very different in the show because while Jay sticks to the figure and looks snug, Kai has a lot exposed around the neckline, as if his gi is hanging loosely on the shoulders and should join Cole in the “For fucks sake it’s an ice realm wear a jacket please” club.

-Worst ninja sui--what the hell happened to Cole and Nya in Hands of Time?! Nya’s main issue is that it’s trying to work too many colours and they just don’t mesh well. I think this was the time they were partially adapting the movie’s change, but they were clinging onto her having red to both represent Samurai X and her ties to her brother, but they should have just picked one or the other because it just doesn’t work the way it did in Skybound. And Cole’s outfit is just hideous. Its balance of colours and accents is all off-kilter, and to top it off the shoes just don’t work and somehow look like socks with sandals. I didn’t know that was doable with a whole suit. Finally, on a general note, I’m not a fan of when the suits are all very similar bar some very, very minor differences. One could argue that it makes them look more like a team, but I prefer the individual personality to come out.

-It’s hard to judge the best and worst episodes, honestly. The seasons from Tournament of Elements onwards are done so tied to each other that picking an episode is rather difficult outside of designated finales (or the odd Jay-focused/Zane-focused episodes that happened in seasons 7, 8 and 9). I guess for best I’d say stuff like The Quiet One, or The Fall, or Grave Danger, or stuff like that would be up there. Worst episodes in those seasons are even harder, because usually it’s how arcs over episodes are written that get to me, not individual episodes. This all being said, it’s much easier to do this with the more episodic first three seasons, and to that end I would still say that Tick Tock is my favourite standalone episode still, and Home is still my least favourite. For all the times the writing has dropped the ball, nothing has legitimately pissed me off more than what this episode did because it’s in its own category of bad writing.

-There have been some concepts thrown in that, while they definitely wouldn’t work out in the long term, make for interesting snippets of what-ifs. Like, I loved the bit where Jay was a show host and got around the stage using his lightning powers. That seems like such a natural fit outside of his ninja identity I wish I’d thought of it. Imagine Bradley Walsh using lightning to get around the studio, that would be metal as fuck.

-On the other side of that coin, the bizarro Ninja are the single most overrated concept in the show. I don’t like Scourge the Hedgehog to begin with, but he at least had some efforts to make him unique (that fell flat, but eh). The bizarro Ninja are the equivalent of Evil Sonic; cliche and undeveloped. They’re not even useful for the cliche idea of framing the actual Ninja since even though they’re seen doing delinquent behaviour, this is never addressed. Heck Nadakhan was more effective with this idea. Thing is that I can’t blame the show at all for this. While the concept is naff, the show itself treats them as they actually were; Garmadon’s puppets and the scheme of the episode. Aside from bizarro Jay’s behaviour to Nya being full of unfortunate implications, there is no greater purpose for their existence, and the show never tries to do it again. It’s really the fans that have inflated their appearance in this case because I guess the idea of “take this nice character and give them an evil version” is just so appealing to the teenage demographic. Screw that, corruption is way more fun and interesting.

-What I can blame the show for is the single worst execution of an idea, because to this point I still consider Kai’s green ninja “arc” in Tournament of Elements to be the single worst executed arc (yeah, even worse than the love triangle, but that one is still bad). The sad thing is it managed to convince me that it wasn’t such a bad concept when they explained it by being an offshoot of his depression following Zane’s death (before that I was very sceptical it could fit it in naturally after the last three seasons). But then it was used once when Skylor tried to get Kai to stab Lloyd in the back during the skating match (which Kai completely rebuffed and seemed over his depression-rooted negative vibes on Lloyd), and once more when he was overcome by the power of the staff. The latter is especially infuriating since this would have been the perfect opportunity for a character moment. Like, Lloyd and/or Skylor could have fought to get Kai out of the trance of the staff and see that his friends mean more to him than having power. It practically writes itself and is a perfect set-up. What happens instead is that Cole is technically the one to save Kai from himself as he rams the Roto Jet into the chamber and makes the rocky serpentine structure come crashing down on Kai. Maybe interesting to read into if you want a Lava reading of the show, but in that moment is just a wasted opportunity. Come on!

-Actually, also talking about other bad concepts, I don’t miss those weird energy dragons they could summon starting from Tournament of Elements. The dragons in Rise of the Serpentine/Legacy of the Green Ninja were fine because they had a logical reason for being there and actually were integrated into the plot (so you got to watch them being maintained and having moments with the ninja). The energy dragons in Tournament of Elements existed for one character as a plot thing (Zane’s, because he always had the good plots in the earlier seasons), but then everyone else suddenly could do it too and they became convenient plot devices and nothing else. Airjutsu I was more okay with because it seems more like a tool they’d use and could be integrated better, but I can also see why that stopped being used (outside of that one bit in Prime Empire).

-The Elemental Masters are both over-hyped and underdeveloped. The normal civilian cast really got the shaft once the series decided it wanted to explore this lore, yet the only ones I really got interested in in any way were the villain EMs and Karlof. And even Karlof is overlooked by the fandom, by the looks of it.

-Jay actually came off the best in the Rebooted love triangle. He’s not entirely perfect, but he is essentially the biggest victim as a result of it in that season, and what Nya and Cole did either bordered on or was outright callous for different reasons. I think if people gave Jay the biggest shtick for Rebooted’s events, it’s influenced with how Skybound botched trying to patch it up.

-The movie was a net positive influence on the show. Aside from me preferring the designs of the movie anyway, it forced the characterisation to actually pick a lane for each character and stick to it, mitigating a lot of the haphazard characterisation issues. The inconsistency in later seasons is tone instead, which is maybe why people thought the characterisation was inconsistent between Sons of Garmadon/Hunted and March of the Oni/SotFS (when really, they weren’t that different if at all). The show also made a good call in ignoring movie Zane’s characterisation; as much as I enjoy it in the film, it really didn’t gel up with what the show had done with him, so trying to force it in would have been more of a characterisation jolt than any of the early season stuff.

-I’m generally fine with Jaya and Pixane. The former I can see why people would be off about it because there have been some badly written periods for them, but I think on the whole it manages to hold it together. The latter was written in surprisingly smoothly given the circumstances, so it’s no wonder I don’t see discourse about it.

-Oh yeah, I don’t get Wu/Faith as a ship. Like, she was the cool drill instructor/aunt to everyone, including Wu. This is a quick one because it’s just a very small aside.

-Also I can’t really get behind Polyninja either. If the characters had a fairly even spread of interaction and moments between each other I could, but the spread ends up like lots of moments between Cole and Kai varying from little moments to huge dollops, and Cole and Jay having a whole best friends affirmation arc due to the fallout of the love triangle, to Kai and Jay having barely anything to work with and anyone with Zane getting a couple of table scraps occasionally. It’s not even enough.

-Following on from that though, Zane feels the least integrated with the group dynamic in general. He’s has some of the best plots and stories in the show, but nearly all of them have been focusing on him solo. And not even SotFS or Prime Empire helped with this one. Hopefully MoM can smooth this one out a bit.

-Finally for this post, after going through all those seasons I still prefer Nya’s movie voice to her show voice by a significant margin. Sorry Kelly Metzger.

I think that’s it. I’ve actually been on this for a week but I’ve been allowing time for more thoughts to come to me, because there have been a lot of thoughts coming in batches. I think I’ll leave it at this though, because I think most of it is covered pretty well.

I have at least two more text posts like this planned, but they’re not strictly about the old seasons so I’ve left them for after. I’m looking forward to them though, because they’re on specific topics and that is my bread and butter pudding.

#ninjago #vedj-f talks #rambling is second nature to me #it's also my first nature

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mariandacalos · 4 years

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Quarantine Diary: An update you did not ask for

Living through a pandemic is a big challenge that we have to face. Especially for people who are not fortunate enough to deal with this whole thing. I, myself, too is struggling. I struggle a lot in my academics, physical, and mental health. It is not easy and it will never be easy.

It's been a while since the last time I posted something. I've been losing my desire in writing, to be honest. It's sad but I am trying myself to get back to it. I know not everyone will read this so I want this post to be personal and for the record, this will be the first personal post that you will be reading here on my blog. I will talk about the things that happened in me since the quarantine started and how it affected me and the things around me.

I did a lot of writings during this quarantine but I kept them in the drafts or on my finder folders. All of it did not even get close to 'finish' which I find frustrating because when I was still in elementary and high school, I always write... about everything. Just give me a word and I will write my thoughts about it. All habits die hard, true, but that doesn't change the fact that eventually, it will die and turn into obscurity.

The first thing that I am struggling with right now is my academics. The university I enrolled in is not considering the mental health–the health in general of their students. Online classes were pushed through and it is not working because not everyone is privileged. Not everyone can afford a laptop, a computer, and an internet connection. Plus, this is the Philippines where internet connection is shitty. I am sometimes late in submissions because of the connection, good thing some professors are considerate but some are just... entitled. I am taking up fine arts and this course requires a lot of plates since it is both lecture and skill-based. I hate the fact that some professors are still pushing the idea of doing plates at home. Most of the students in our class including me don't have any materials because we left it on our dorms and we are now in our respective home towns.

Tang ina, ang hirap. Ang hirap basta walang pake ang Gobyerno at ang Presidente. Tang ina. Ang hirap, ang hirap maging mahirap.

I am also struggling with my mental health. These days, the voices inside my head were so loud, and they are even louder at night. I've been sleeping late, 3 AM or worse 6 AM. I can't sleep because obviously, sleep requires peace and I am not close to getting that. It is affecting my health because I wake up late. 2 PM is the new morning and dinner is the new lunch for me. I never wanted any of this but we are living though a pandemic and my mind kept on thinking about every single thing. From how shitty our Government in dealing with this pandemic down to how shitty our school is because they value more the scientia over virtus and devotio.

I by the way joined mass organization this month. I'm one of the creatives of STAND where we fight not just for the students' rights but the rights for everyone. We are currently in a battle with our school admin. We keep on writing letter and making pubmats to them. I am assigned into making pubmats and It feels good. You know, doing something that I am good at to fight for the betterment of everyone. Using my talent for a good cause. I am also the newly elected International Director of Rotaract USC Cebu, and we are having our regular meetings, it's been hard since we cannot go out (most of our programs needs social interaction btw) and we have to work of something that we have at home hence, the online meeting, online postings, etc. It's good to know that I am not completely useless, that I have a contribution, at least in my little ways.

Too much negativity eh? Let's talk about how I am coping up despite all of this unwanted things that is happening. I will not lie, I've been living a very unhealthy lifestyle since the quarantine started. I sleep late, I wake up late, I eat unhealthy foods, and I eat late. Although it is working for me and my body is not yet suffering the consequences of my unhealthy lifestyle, I want to break it and slowly by slowly redirect my path to the right one. And if you, the one who is reading is also experiencing the same thing, you're with me! I'm with you! we gonna be better soon.

I always try to not stay in my room during the day because when I do, I just sleep or binge watch series which is bad because I sometimes forget to eat. I'm the type of person whose bothered when there is nothing to do. It just gives me time to contemplate unnecessary thoughts and fight those loud voices in my head to one of the coping mechanism that works for me is organizing and cleaning out things. I love organizing stuff! from folding clothes, to washing the dishes with a new dishwashing foam and bubbly dishwashing liquid, arranging my books, basically anything about organizing. It just gives me this certain satisfaction that I do not get from doing other things. Well, it sometimes can be my downside because I tend to over work myself.. geez. I love working okay.

I am also trying out different kind of recipes (snacks and beverages). I had a lot of fun and my tummy is also happy, so are the tummy of the people surrounding me.

I'm doing a lot of digital arts lately, it's a good thing because I get to hone my skills in illutrating stuff digitally. The routine is to finish a good series (because I do consider the color grading of the film, the casting, production, the ost, typeface used, basically everything) then make a fan art out of it. Sometimes, I sketch on paper, scan it then render it digitally which is fun and liberating because I do not have to follow a guide sheet like our classes lol.

Looking back, I don't think it's entirely unproductive. It's unhealthy sure, but I think I did things that falls into the 'productive' list.

Please do not be pressured if people around you and what you see in social media is all doing productive things, or doing workouts/exercise. Remember that we are living through a pandemic and this is not some sort of vacation or summer break. This is a quarantine thing and you should look after yourself. You should do things that can help you get through and calm. Be easy on yourself and take all of the time you have to be stable. Find the coping mechanism that works for you.

Remember that everything in this world is temporary, even change. This season in our life will pass and I hope that It will serve as a lesson for us to do better next time. To be more responsible citizen. To wisely choose a government, to enroll into an institution that cares for us, to support a brand that cares and give back, to give appreciation to both front and back liners. To be a good citizen.

Wow that was a long rant-slash-thoughts, if you get 'til here, thank you for listening. I do not have anyone to talk to about my sentiments so I thought of posting it here. If it not too much to ask for, message me on my ask box if you've read all of this and let's talk (you can go anonymous). :)

Marian

#journal

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kamino-ink · 6 years

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Behind The Mask | Lee Felix

✧ Genre: Spiderman!au, fluff, angst

✧ Summary: You’ve started to notice how your friend has begun to show up to class absolutely exhausted, always falling asleep - he claims it’s just his schoolwork and his internship, but what you don’t know is that his so-called “internship” is actually his duty to serve the people of Queens as Spiderman.

✧ Word Count: 3.2k

✧ Check out my masterlist!

✧

“So, class, as you can clearly see on the board, there are about four key reasons why water is so vitally important to us, as human beings, and the planet itself-”

“Do you think this is how he dirty talks to his husband in bed?” Jisung whispered to you across the lab table, leaning dangerously close to a stray beaker on the edge of the desk.

“Dude, I didn't need that image in my mind. Thanks a lot.” You groan sarcastically to the amused boy, discretely reaching over to slide the beaker closer to the middle of the table so the clumsy kid would (hopefully) not somehow manage to break it.

Jisung sticks his tongue out at you before turning his attention to a very dazed looking blonde beside you. “Come on, it was funny - right, Lix…? Felix? Hellooo?”

You tilt your head slightly in curiosity as to why the boy next to you wasn’t answering his other friend, your gaze drifting over to his slumped over form. He was just barely holding his head up with his chin resting on the palms of his hands, though his legs drooped down to the floor, the bottoms of his shoes swaying above the ground. His black turtleneck was covered up by the plaid shirt draped over it’s material, though spots of the coal colored cloth was made visible by the odd tears in the overlapping shirt.

Lately, you’ve begun to notice something... off, about your close friend. He was mostly quiet, unless he was with you or Jisung, choosing to crack stupid jokes around the two of you instead of trying to amuse a larger crowd. That hadn’t changed, really, but Felix was starting to make weird excuses to not hang out with either of you after school some days - this didn’t happen every single day, of course. Though, whenever you saw him again either at school or outside of it, the teenage boy would be covered in spots of dark bruises or little cuts protected from the outside air by bandages (usually Star Wars or Hello Kitty ones, curtesy of his aunt.)

Needless to say, you were starting to wonder if maybe Felix had somehow managed to have a run in with a bad crowd - perhaps he had been influenced by them, hence the cuts and bruises.

“Yo Felix, wake up,” you grunt, noticing how your teacher had paused for a split second in his lecture to send a heated glare to the dozing boy, “what’s up with you? This is the third time you’ve nearly fallen asleep in class just today. It’s not even eleven.”

The blonde slowly adjusted his position on the stool, now choosing to let out a whine as he let his tired body lead him to lean on your shoulder for support - mostly for his head. “s’ the Stark Internship, Y/N, I already told you guys like a miiiilion times.”

“I am going to personally beat Tony fucking Stark up if he keeps making you work so hard. Does the man have his head so far up his ass that he can’t see how exhausted you are?”

“Look, I swear he isn’t overworking me. I’ll be on a break soon, promise.”

“Pinky promise?”

He lets out a soft sigh, begrudgingly bringing up one of his hands from his lap to link his pinky finger with your own.

“Pinky promise.”

“Fuck me!” Felix screamed into his pillow, completely ignoring a smirking, amused Jisung sat at his own desk just a mere few feet away.

“Eh, I think I’ll pass,” the cheeky teen snickers, dodging a pillow that the younger had thrown violently at him from his spot on the bottom bunk, “you kind of did this to yourself, Lix. You pinky promised Y/N that you wouldn’t let Stark overwork you-”

“But it isn’t Mr. Stark telling me to do all these jobs, Jisung! I’m the one who keeps putting myself in these shitty situations.” The blonde shot back almost too quickly in his hero’s defense, throwing his legs over the edge of his bed so he could properly sit up and face his friend.

An entire week had since passed the day in chemistry class where you had made Felix pinky promise to take a real break from his “internship.” What you obviously didn’t know was that Tony Stark had little to no time to direct Felix’s superhero antics each and every day or night; it was all him, for the most part. In fact, you weren’t even aware of Felix’s superhero alter ego - Spiderman. Only Jisung was aware of his otherwise secret identity, not including the amazing scientist himself. Sure, he sort of felt guilty about not telling you of his secret, especially since he knew you would support him through thick and thin, no matter what - the only thing that might change or, well, increase is your babying of him. You already worried enough about his consistent injures, why should he put that burden of knowledge on your head?

But now, the injures had gotten worse - he had a run in with some ragtag gang of robbers at a convenience store a couple nights ago, and one of the bastards had managed to slash through his suit deep enough to leave a mark on his arm. The following day, he had neglected to wear longer sleeves, which meant that his bandaged wound was open for anyone to see - and boy had you seen it.

“Felix, what the fuck happened to you?” The burning question had been on the tip of your tongue the entire day at school, only you had decided to wait to confront Felix about it until you both began to walk home.

“I uh - nothing, I swear - I just got... mugged?” He lied to you through gritted teeth, the following laugh stained with awkwardness.

“How the fuck were you mugged in broad daylight?”

“Well, um it was actually like... around eleven, I guess?”

“What - Lix, why in the world were you out so late? There is no way in hell May would’ve let you out at that time for no reason.” You whirled around on him now in the middle of the otherwise deserted sidewalk, crossing your arms over you chest impatiently.

“S-Stark Internship? Yeah! I was supposed to get some field work done before the next morning and I forgot the other half of the day, s-so I had to finish it really late.”

Needless to say, you had quickly snapped in a blind, chilling rage, badmouthing the multi-millionaire in front of his nervous intern, who first came to you as your best friend. You brought up the fact that Felix had promised to take a break from the exhausting internship, to which the already perplexed, panicked teenager had then snapped at you of all people, saying that this internship was basically his duty - his life. Since then, you had been silent towards the boy all week, refusing to speak to him out of pure agitation, worry, and hurt.

“Listen, I know that this entire ‘I’m a superhero’ thing is really, really important to you. But you have to take a step back and look at the bigger picture sometimes; clearly you’re working too much, and between school and your spidey-shit, I’m honestly surprised you haven’t collapsed yet.” The brunette admitted bluntly. “This isn’t healthy like, at all. I doubt Stark would appreciate you getting hurt so often just because you feel obligated to make him proud.”

Before Felix could even get a word of retaliation out, he heard his phone’s ringtone faintly going off somewhere on his mess of a bed. He was about to just ignore whoever was calling at such an ungodly hour, but after a sharp glare from Jisung, he tossed a pillow and curled up blanket from the corner of his bed onto the floor to reach his still ringing phone.

A picture you had taken of all three of you huddled together during Christmas last year displayed itself on the bright screen, showcasing your bright smiles and red cheeks from the cold day last year. The time read one-thirteen in the morning.

Why were you calling so late?

“Hello-”

“L-Lix?” Your voice comes out as a stuttered whisper, immediately grabbing his rapt attention as he presses a button on his phone and puts you on speaker.

“Y/N, why are you calling?” He notices Jisung shake his head from his seat, clearly wanting you to keep talking considering the dangerously low, nervous tone you were using.

“I fell asleep on the train and m-missed my stop a while ago. I started walking home, b-but now these two people are following me. I - I think I’m close to the bank down the street, could you - could you come get me?”

Felix shoots out of his spot on the comfy bed, tossing his phone onto the comforter while he darts over to his closet in a hurry. “Y-yeah, of course! Just don’t stop walking, okay? And stay on the phone-”

“-Felix!”

The line cuts off.

Jisung throws himself up from his seat by the desk and grabs Felix’s phone from his bed, turning his back to the boy as he starts to slide his suit onto his body in a rush. “Felix, she won’t pick up the phone now!” He says quickly, continuing to spam your contact even when they run out of the apartment - not bothering to see if May was awake or not.

“She said that she’s by the bank, right? I’ll swing over there and take care of the creeps, you call the police and meet me there.” The superhero tells the following boy his plan, already shooting out a splatter of webs onto the side of the building so he can swing into the air.

He knew that you wouldn’t hang up on him, especially after calling him for help. It was likely that you had already called the authorities beforehand just in case, but he was too worried that they wouldn’t be able to get to you in time. Felix had already lost too many people that he loved in his life, he wasn’t about to risk losing you too.

The city of Queens was relatively peaceful during the darkest hours of the night, with a good handful of its otherwise lively residents choosing to stay in the comfort of their homes rather than walking around at that vulnerable time slot. While everyone was more than aware of the superhero presence in their world and, specifically for them in the case of the web-slinging hero, city, the rising danger of criminal activity pushed them to refute from stepping outside when the villains might be lurking about in the shadows. This left the city of Queens to be oddly silent during those particular hours, which is why Felix would so easily hear your desperate screaming even before he had turned the next corner that led to the closed bank.

“Let go of me, you assholes!” You shout at the perps, your voice coming out strangled in taut pain from how the manicured nails of the woman dig into the skin of your neck, her wrist pressing down harshly onto the front of it to regulate your pained breathing. Fighting back had proven useless, as each time you even tried to swing a leg at the powerful woman she would only further intrude onto your sensitive skin, drawing copious amounts of blood that dribbled down your neck and onto your exposed shoulder, the sleeve of your shirt having been ripped in the initial struggle.

“No one is coming to save you, angel,” the man taunts you from a few feet away, cracking his neck, “not the cops or whoever you called. They won’t be able to piece your damn body back together - you see, my sister here has an acquired taste for blood, but mostly from pretty little girls like you.”

“-Hey now, isn’t that cannibalism or something? Cause’ let me tell you, drinking human blood is not normal. Dude, that is so messed up.”

In sync, all three of you twist your heads to look to wherever the sudden voice had come from in the dead of the night, the nails digging into your skin in the back of your mind the second someone else had suddenly appeared.

Perched on top of a dimly lit lamppost was a figure you never would have thought you would be able to see in person - or in a sticky situation like the one you were currently tied into.

It was him - Spiderman.

The young superhero casually hopped off of the lamppost and onto the sidewalk, the pads of his covered feet soundless even then - it was no wonder that none of you had heard him approaching. “Alright creepy lady, if you could let my fr- erm, my little buddy go it would be greatly appreciated. Kinda makes my job easier.” He hums nonchalantly, his bug-eyes seeming to move with his suit as he analyzes the situation at hand.

The redhead practically strangling you lets out a growl, sounding eerily similar to a wild dog, and easily releases her grip on your neck. Your back slumps against the brick wall as you take deep breaths, your throat sore from the strong pressure, stinging pain from her long nails ringing in your head.

“A spider, huh?”

“Everyone has a gimmick these days.” The brother retorts sourly, twisting his neck to make it ‘pop’ again while his sister steps up beside his shorter form. “Come on, Spiderboy, I would love to dissect your organs and the girl’s!”

“I mean, you guys totally brought this onto yourselves.” He quips, not even hesitating to sling out four splotches of his webbing onto the creepy criminals, effectively ensnaring them into the sticky substance.

But it could never be that easy, and Felix probably should've been expecting that much.

While he had been making his way towards your shaking body still leaning against the wall for support, he had left his back turned to the two perps. Because of his keen focus on making sure you were still, you know, breathing, he hadn't noticed that the woman had tore through the web - not until he felt an all too familiar tingling sensation run up his arms, sending his hairs flying under the tightness of his suit.

Before he could spin around and protect the both of you, she had snagged her nails - more like claws - underneath the hem of his mask, pulling it completely over his head and slinging it to the ground. The next few seconds were like a blur to you as Spiderman turned on his heels and threw the woman back onto the concrete with a sickening thud, splaying his web all over her from head-to-toe, including her entire skull so she couldn't catch a glimpse of his exposed face.

But it was too late - you had already seen him.

“F-Felix?”

Said teenage boy whips his head around the second you utter his name in a shaky, bewildered tone. He sees the confusion, hurt, and complete awe in your glazed over eyes; you had seen him, you had figured it out without even needing to try.

Lee Felix was Spiderman.

“... so what you’re saying is I have even more reason to beat the ever living shit out of Tony Stark?”

The blonde hisses a word of protest at your monotone grunt, accidently pressing down a bit too hard on the gauze he was using to wrap up your bloodied neck, which made you whimper softly in pain - almost immediately the boy bandaging you up paused in his movements, the tips of his cold fingers grazing your skin midair.

“You’re fine, Lix. Keep going.” You uttered to the cautious boy quietly, watching his every hesitant move in the reflection painted on his bathroom mirror.

When he had heard the sound of police sirens and the frantic shouting of Jisung approaching the bank a few minutes ago, Felix had panicked and grabbed his mask, slipping it over his head before he had scooped you up into his arms and swung back to his apartment. Luckily May had been in a deep sleep, so she wasn’t there to pester you two about your shared injuries.

Jisung was on his way back, of course, since Felix had texted him a quick sentenced summary of what had happened.

“Are you not - how are you not angry at me right now, Y/N?” Your best friend questioned you, guilt seeping into his soft, broken voice so much that it made your heart squeeze in your chest.

“I’ll admit, I’m kind of ticked off that Han fucking Jisung knew before me, but I suppose I can forgive you for, you know... saving my life.” You laugh weakly, blinking slowly at the reflection of the boy, still clad in his blue and red suit, carefully finishing off the bandaging on your neck. While it most certainly was not the appropriate time for your pitiful heart to start racing in your chest at his close proximity and soft breaths fanning out onto your chilly skin, you couldn't help but fall into a short-lived daze when the boy grabs onto your thighs and turns you to face him.

“I - I did want to tell you Y/N, I swear,” he mumbles, “Jisung found out on accident, and uh, obviously Mr. Stark knows because he gave me this suit n’ all. Don’t - don’t be pissed at him for encouraging me to do this, please? I was already sort of doing this stuff before he found me.”

“But why, Lix?” You huff a bit selfishly, looking down at the floor of his tiny bathroom. “You could seriously get hurt doing this - we’re just kids, we’re supposed to be doing stupid shit like - like falling in love, going to the arcade with friends, and going to dumbass parties just for the free food.”

“Because I’m the friendly neighborhood Spiderman, Y/N. I want to protect the people of Queens, and outside of it - I wasn't able to save my uncle, but... I have helped so many other people doing what I’m doing. I mean... I was able to save someone else I love, for once, tonight.” He whispers to you softly, lifting your chin with a single finger so you can meet his steady gaze.

In all your time being friends with him, you don’t recall ever seeing Lee Felix looking so serious.

“I was actually able to save you, Y/N - god I was so fucking worried when you called because y-you sounded so scared and I wasn’t there to prevent any of it from happening. I’m so thankful that I got to you before something terrible happened.”

“I-”

“Please don't interrupt, for once I’m actually talking about how I feel without chickening out like I usually do,” Felix laughs quietly, watching as your lips twitch into a small smile at his truthful words, leaving him to keep speaking, “I like you - love you, so much, Y/N. S-so, if you don’t mind, could I - could I possibly kiss you?”

You nod with no hesitation, feeling your cheeks heat up when he gulps and starts to lean in, closer and closer until you lips are brushing against each other.

“... so should I shut the door before May inevitably wakes up and potentially sees you two kissing? It might weird her out since Spiderman is kissing her nephew’s best friend.”

“Jisung-”

“I’ll take that as a yes.”

✧

#skzwriters #stray kids #stray kids au #stray kids scenario #stray kids imagine #stray kids drabble #stray kids superhero au #stray kids spiderman au #lee felix #felix scenario #felix imagine #lee felix spiderman au #stray kids fluff #stray kids angst

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fantroll-purgatory · 5 years

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first submission here!

First troll I’m sending in here I’m EXCITED AND NERVOUS about how this is gonna go down! AaaaaH!

This is a really solid troll! You’ve really though these things out. I’m probably going to have minimal recommendations for changes! World: AU Alternia! Many of this AU’s differences don’t effect this first fantroll I’m sending for review here though; and I feel as if it would be more applicable to put the AU differences with characters that are heavily influenced in that regard. Name: Dipala Venmor - Dipala comes from the scientific name of a species of bee-flies. She’s quite the “busy bee” and has a love of gossip or being like a ‘fly on the wall’, hence the connection. And bee flies are a species of insect that invade actual bee hives to lay their eggs and raise their young. So with goldbloods having an association with bees; I figured that Dipala’s theme being that of a “fake bee” and being a caste below them would make for a weird joke in context. - Venmor comes from the vena amorus, or the vein of love. It’s supposedly a vein located in the ring finger that is connected to the heart directly. Which is why we put wedding rings on our ring fingers and whatnot. She’s looking for love, pity, hate, and rivalry in all the wrong places. ((more on that later, ha ha.))

These are both great names for her! One comment I have is that bees aren’t so much associated with golds as they are associated with Sollux in particular. Remember that on Alternia, bees are probably most associated with technology because of the power of Apiculture Networking. I think Bee Fly is still a great themeatic tie for her, though. She is both interested in technology through webdesigning and leeches off of other people. Very Bee Fly.

Age: 7 sweeps ((approximately around 15 years old))

Story: ((Don’t worry I included info for her theme after the goals section; as I felt that understanding my goals for this would make the theme troubles make sense in context!!)) Onto Dip’s story synopsis real quick: Dipala Venmor is one of my fantroll session’s premier troublemakers. She’s a HUGE gossip loving, rumor mongering, wannabe information broker for the Alternian Fleet…… although because of her blood color she’ll most likely get stuck moving cargo around a ship than deal with any sort of secret spilling and collecting job that would be more in-line for olives and up. And that she’s also still a kid so no ship will be picking her up anytime soon. But hey; she can still have a hobby, right? There have to be other trolls interested in the scandalous happenings in the world besides herself…… right? Unfortunately for us and whatever troll catches Dipala’s eyes… she’s not exactly wrong about her fellow trolls across the hemospectrum wanting to know this sort of shit. So for now she mostly runs a couple of blogs and social media accounts dealing with all kinds of Alternian gossip around celebrities of all kinds and highblood shenanigans. Especially highbloods though because she adores all the drama they get into and start up 24/7 given their more aggressive natures and whatnot. To her it’s just like watching reality TV! However she’s also keen to spread falsehoods too, just to see what would happen. She’d also probably be deader than a doornail at this point if it weren’t for a lot of her innate talents and being REALLY FRIGGIN’ GOOD AT BEING DISHONEST AND SNEAKY. When she isn’t causing trouble and gathering facts and half-truths to keep herself safe and sound or her and her followers sick amusement; she works as a kind of job that’s a mix between a medical assistant and a tech support gal for other trolls in her humble suburb/subgrub area; and accepting supplies of mind honey as payment so she can satisfy one preferred half of her lusus’ diet. She knows her way around all sorts of troll biotech due to her more pervasive hobbies and her own psychic powers; so by extension Dipala is quite knowledgeable on how things work and how the tech interacts with the rust/bronze/gold and limebloods it can inevitably involve. So some of the trolls in her hivestem/apartment complex view her as exceptionally important and helpful despite her many, MANY secrets. Why she doesn’t pursue this as a main hobby instead of her other far more invasive ones is beyond me. Other than that she interacts and befriends/becomes enemies with/flirts with the other trolls in her eventual Sgrub session. And will hopefully become a better person after that shiny new universe pops into existence. I hope. I’m still very much scripting out how I want her, her session, and my fankids’ stories work out. So I hope I managed to be concise about what I have for her story thus far!!

One thing you should definitely ask about this background is how a bronzeblood like her got access to the medical equipment necessary to take care of medical assistant stuff. I know she has the psychic powers that you discuss later down the line, but there’s still a bit of technical particularity to be accounted for and we’ve seen that lowblood access to medical care is questionable (they don’t get prescription glasses but they do get wheelchairs if they need) (who knows what Alternia is doing).

Does she home-grow the materials she needs for biomedical implants. Does she work Under another, richer troll who has more resources and can thus provide this service? Did she USED to work under another, richer troll and then steal their shit/kill them/usurp them/blackmail them/etc?

Oh oh oh another fun thing you could do is try to play like. The Doctor-Barber sort of angle. She’s the local medical helped and ALSO the local hairdresser for all the other lowbloods in the hivestem. And you know what hairdressers do? Gossip. What a busy bee (;

Another question is why she doesn’t just grow the apiculture network to produce mind honey herself? Silicomb Beehouses sound like exactly the kind of biotechnological material she might be able to impact with her psychic powers. Bronzes love Creature Comforts, so her making her own lususfood and using payment to buy herself nice things would be more in line with Bronze Tendencies. Chase that highblood luxury from the comfort of your shitty apartment.

Goals: Hooo boy how am I gonna put all of my billions of questions here?? I want to make sure my girl Dipala here isn’t a Vriska ripoff. As well as making sure that she’s an okay character and not overpowered in general.

She’s definitely not a Vriska ripoff! She has a totally different character and set of interests to Vriska. Was Vriska a biomedical gossip girl? Is Dipala an ancestor-obsessed pirate? No to both of those? You’re good. You’re un-Vriska. For further clarification, I had a LOT of fantrolls and kids. I now downsized the trolls back down to 12 to fit a “session theme” like the canon ones did with the zodiac. However; all my trolls still have a lot of remnants of their older themes mixed with the new, so I’m also kind of paranoid that wouldn’t work or be concise and concrete enough for them if that makes any sense? My trolls were also all created before Hiveswap and the Friendsim; so many of the psychic powers I gave my fantrolls then wouldn’t technically be canon. But at the same time I also feel like straight up changing their powers to the more canon ones kind of messes with their themes and who they are as characters.

Characters in homestuck always have multiple things going on that make them more well-rounded and interesting! Equius was into archery and horses because he was Sagittarius themed, but he also liked Robotics, and that didn’t take away from the cohesion of his character. More interests and themeatic building can sometimes take away from a theme if it doesn’t make sense, but generally speaking, additional layers of complexity are a good thing.

As for powers, there’s usually ways to keep them similar while also tightening them up into EZ Standards anyways! I also feel as if my characters or parts of them are “too quirky”. Seeing as Homestuck has a lot of weird stuff going on in it that make it what it is, I’ve been trying to sort of channel that into all my ocs. And whether or not I’m successful with that, I legitimately have no idea. Sometimes I feel as if I may have went over the top to a ridiculous degree or am making a character way too bland and uninteresting.

Listen, writing characters (especially HS characters) is all about having fun. So long as you’re having a good time, Quirk It Up. Homestuck is all about batshit characterization. I should also add that I’m the anon from WAAAAAAY back who youth rolled into your ask box asking about character interests and their voice, and how to differentiate them. And other than than that the only thing I can think of that I’d be remotely confused about would be the dream moon and classpect! Because when you got 12 trolls who can’t share the aspects/classes etc; things can get a tad difficult figuring which aspect goes well with which character. In conclusion: I’m actually very nervous and could use all the help I can get!

Well, we’ll help you sort it all out! Theme: My overarching theme for my 12 trolls are all the lyrics to the Twelve Days of Christmas song. Each troll represents one of the gifts given to the singer in that song. However the order of the gifts given isn’t the hemospectrum order; but the order in which the trolls enter their game’s Medium. Dipala here is the fifth gift! The five gold rings! However she also has a bit of a spy and “fly on the wall” theme going on that’s a remnant of her being a Musca constellation themed troll. But I thought the old theme could work and mix well with the new theme. I mean there is that old saying “like flies to honey”; as in trapping things by seeming “””nice”””. Honey is gold and sweet. And since she’s so tricky; she’s not even an actual goldblood. She’s basically a trickery sandwich with layers of lies. And if you REALLY want to get crazy, the mineral Pyrite can come in colors similar the to the color of bronze used in the hemospectrum. Pyrite is called fool’s gold. Dipala is deceptive and isn’t actually goldblooded despite her psychic powers.

What you’re doing here is what I call “overjustifying.” You don’t have to do backflips of logic to explain two concurrent themes. To go back to Vriska- she’s obviously spider/scorpio themed, but she also is themed around pirates, and it’s not because (what I’m about to say is made up) Pirates Used To Use Scorpio To Guide Themselves While At Sea And– no, she just likes pirates. She just has fun doing pirate things. You don’t have to stress yourself out trying to make these kinds of connections, because they can ultimately cheapen things and make them feel one-note. She is 5-gold-ring themed and also likes to gossip and spy on people. Don’t stress about it too much, that’s all you gotta say. Also she’s bronze because the symbol language is big on circles. The shape of rings. And seeing as I already have had my trolls with an established blood color for so long; Dipala to me looks really off to be and does not fit the personality parameters that the gold signs seem to have in the extended zodiac. And to me making the goldblood the “five gold rings” character felt too obvious, and her design with the goldblood color pallet didn’t look right to me either and I wanted to try subverting expectations. Whether this does or does not work well with Dipala, I’ll leave that for you rad blog mods to help me with this if you feel I might have picked the wrong color and whatnot.

I think she works well for a bronze! You’ll just have to do the legwork to make her fit that bronzeblood coloration, but I definitely think she suits it well. I also think you need to stop leaning on the goldblood association so much. Don’t worry about it. No one is going to connect her to goldbloods if you don’t draw that connection yourself. Hopefully that makes her name meaning and my goals for the review here a bit more clear!

Strife Specibus: Taserkind. She’s bug themed kinda so it makes her a bug zapper. I will not apologize for this shocking pun. Gold is also a metal that conducts electricity pretty well. She’s the five gold rings. S T E A L T H P U N S .

Fetch Modus: Password Journal. You ever see those shitty password journal toys that were voice activated? And how you had to be super clear when saying your password to get it open again? And how nine times out of ten it was just a shitty piece of technology that just never worked when you needed it to? That’s Dipala’s modus. And unlike the biotech she works with; this is that same shitty hunk of plastic. She thought it would be cool to use a modus that’s so mysterious and eccentric. But now she just regrets putting her mitts on the thing and now has to deal with a piece of tech she has no frame of reference for how it works. Buuuut she’s also too stubborn to give up on figuring out on how it works now! Any day she’ll figure it out!! As for how she came across a modus unlike the rest of her world’s tech? Her modus was sent with her on her respective Sgrub meteor as a wiggler.

Okay I love this.

Blood Color: Bronze

Symbol and Meaning: It’s a combination of multiple symbols to fit the bronzeblood alphabet and her theme. Said mix includes five empty circles to represent the five gold rings. But it also combines the alchemical sign for honey and the astronomical sign for the sun. The sun has ties to gold symbolically; and the honey alchemy symbol is actually in reference to her lusus! The positioning of the sign was also done to slightly reflect for the symbol used for the Musca ((or fly)) constellation. And for the record, I have a headcanon that IS canon in my AU Alternia that each sign in the extended zodiac as a HUGE variety of alternate signs for each sign. In Dipala’s case, her symbol would be one of the many, MANY variants for the Taurittanius sign. Or, if you think Void or Prospit shouldn’t be Dipala’s respective aspect and dream moon; it would then be a variant for whatever the name of her “new” zodiac sign she’d get upon revision.

I think that’s a good way to look at things, and it works well for the sign language!

Handle: gadflysFalderal [GF] Gadfly refers to a person who antagonizes or pokes fun at another person just for the heck of it. It’s also a pun because of her “fly on the wall” theming here. Falderal is a synonym for nonsense and can also mean a showy but useless item, fussing over things and can also refer to a “meaningless refrain in a song”. Also her trolltag’s acronym is GF. Her dream of some sort of future quadrant romance is right out there in the open. ((I should also give a quick heads up that my kids’ and trolls’ handles go by a different four letter username pattern. The canon gang all had the GCAT to choose from because it’s tied to DNA and how they have all participated in creating a new life/universe. But here the go-to acronym is GIFT. Because the troll’s overarching theme is of the aforementioned obnoxious Christmas carol.))

Quirk: All uses of s become two z’s. Z’s also double. When excited or expressive she quintuples all of her o’s. Also uses a TON of heart emojis that look like little bugs; and will every once in a while make a few bug puns. Like “Do I have your antennation??” or “if you would listen I wouldn’t have to bug you all the time!” and even asking at times for “hive fives!”. She uses these puns very rarely though; and more often than not the shitty jokes are just utilized to annoy the ever-loving fuck out of people for the heck of it. Her online disposition is basically an unholy slurry combination of an overly and almost sickeningly sweet attitude with a somewhat subverted “”valley girl”” or “popular and prissy popular middle school girl”” archetype. Be very afraid. Here have some quirk examples real quick: The quick, brown fox jumpzz over the lazzy dooooog! 03 03 03

This is great.

Special Abilities: Dipala can “commune” psychically with troll biotechnology. Since troll tech seems to be a weirdass unknown husk thing; and living tendrils can connect to psiionic trolls to power friggin’ SPACESHIPS… I figured it wouldn’t be too much of a stretch for a troll to have superpowers to talk/slightly control the stuff through thoughts alone. If bronzebloods talking or controlling animals is a very common psychic ability for them, why not their biotech? However; since her old eye got stabbed and replaced with a robot one by a friend of hers after an accident… her ability feels “muffled” to her; as she can accidentally mess with her own eye inadvertently if she isn’t paying attention or experiencing stress or frustration with communing with these kinds of computers. So it works, but she has to really put her all in it to figure out what’s going on with it. use it. However; after she turned 6 sweeps, she started to develop a second psychic power.

Biotech IS a living organism that isn’t a troll, so I definitely think it falls under the dominion of what bronzes would be able to communicate with. But we have seen through Vriska and Equius that Robotics and Biotechnology are definitely two differentiated things on Alternia. She would need a biotech eye specifically if it was going to be a problem. And even then you could argue that maybe her eye could Advance her powers in that instance? Maybe that could even be the initiation for the second psychic power (; This “newer” psychic power is she can read troll’s minds. She’s unsure of how exactly she developed it in the first place; but she hypothesizes it might be tied to how often she’d interact with the occasional troll tied into all sorts of gadgets. It takes a LOT of concentration on her part to get it to work. If she gets extremely angry, frustrated, flustered, or upset it might not work at all; or even succeed but giving her the wrong thought or piece of information that she intended to use or want to find out. And even then, since she’s only been practicing with it for one sweep thus far; it still can get very bad or unwanted information. She could intend to pull out a secret she wants to know deep in her target’s brain; but end up receiving and experiencing the target’s daydream or find out what they’re going to get at the grocery store that day.This power works on all trolls, but Dipala’s power is also in danger of being useless if the one specific troll in question is experiencing forgetfulness, confusion, or other kinds of memory or knowledge issues her target might be experiencing. The thoughts she could get back from these instances are either incredibly jumbled or incomprehensible to varying degrees, or she might not get back or find anything at all!

Remember that lowblood psychic powers don’t work as well against highbloods and that ceruleans in particular have a very strong psychic fortitude. If you don’t want her to be overpowered, keep this thing in mind. Her abilities would probably be least effective against Ceruleans, Blues, and Indigos, with Ceruleans and Indigos probably giving her some type of consequence for trying to jack into their brains. Get chucklevoodoo’d, motherfucker. Her robot eye offers her psychic powers very little in the way of improving them. She can access a sort of lock-on like targeting system to help her with focusing and honing in on the thoughts she wants to extract from troll’s heads… but since her eye has a built-in tech that gives her 24/7 access to the internet……. She often gets social media updates at the worst times possible and break her focus. It’s kind of hard to see things when a random ad pops up in her field of vision. She can scroll through troll’s version of twitter even while she’s sleeping and unconscious, but at what cost? And yes, she is often exposed to pro-empire popup ads and subliminal messages like Jane Crocker was exposed to on her computer in canon, too. I also like the idea that when she is using her powers or in deep thought about something, her little robotic pupil turns into the swirly loading circle ring-like cursor. Or use emojis or emoticons in real life inadvertently. For one example, if someone gave her a wonderful surprise gift her pupil would look like her quirk’s hearts emoticons: 03 03 03. I’d give more ridiculous examples, but there’s waaaaay more important things I gotta put in this wall of text submission still! Lusus/Guardian: A bugbear. Just imagine a very large bear with fly or bug-like eyes and antennae. Yeah it’s kinda freaky. Its main diet consists of mind honey and all sorts of raw meats. And due to her confined living space in a hivestem apartment complex, Dipala often has to take her mom for walks to keep it healthy, fit, and regulated. The last thing you want is an angry bear with cabin fever in your home! Her lusus also accompanies her and is utilized in her current field of work/psychic help day job. And the younger trolls Dipala helps LOVE her lusus, as it isn’t too aggressive in regards to younger and fairly harmless young trolls and their respective animal parents. But like most bears, you don’t mess with it and it won’t mess with you. And because of this lusus; you can see that Dipala’s symbol has the alchemy honey sign incorporated into it is a reference to bear paws, like her bearmom!

Interests: Gossip, stalking ((although she would never refer to it as such)), social media, blogging, trolling online, investigative journalism, writing diary entries ((and reading other diaries that do not belong to her)), web design, quite a few other computer or technology related activities, people watching and lurking on other’s social media pages, homemade remedies and first aid, social events ((like nights out with her friends, parties, dates, tutoring younger trolls with tech stuff, just hanging out in general)), TV crime dramas like Alternia’s equivalent to Law and Order and whatnot, romance shows, any sort of big star-studded movie, anything in media related to secret agents or spies ((she has crushes on the many different Troll James Bonds)), and is slightly involved in online fandom’s shipping and fanart culture for her respective shows and movies. She would also enjoy shopping; but given how the Alternia’s retail businesses and delivering or selling things to lowbloods being late and whatnot……. Yeah she has a bit of a love/hate relationship with the activity.

Okay… you know how sometimes people online will create social media accounts posing as celebrities. What if she does that sometimes. Engaging passionately in RPF really ups the Creepy Factor. Also:

[Dipala voice] Tell me Kenneth, has a cheesy tabloid journalist ever won the Pulitzer?

(Don’t mind me I have terminal referencing Scream (1996) disease)

Personality: Dipala is an exceptionally cheery and bubbly gal. She loves socializing and interacting with other people not only a socialite level; but a sociological one as well. As I’ve stated prior in the submission here; she’s really good at keeping things under wraps despite her jabberjaw tendency and preference to be overly affectionate and predominantly open with most people who come into contact with her. Despite hiding a lot of various kinds of info or secrets isn’t using a facade to hide things as a distraction; she really is this energetic and socially indulgent with others. Which might be worse, now that I think about it.

In contrast to most teens in her age group; she’s surprisingly confident in herself and actually has a healthy level self-esteem that doesn’t trail off into outright arrogance. And combing this confidence with her sugary-sweet demeanor, she can be quite the effective manipulator if the need arises. Making Dipala equally likely to be a suck up and kiss-ass when in trouble, or make someone feel really bad about themselves if they do something bad to her. She’s also outgoing in the sense that she has a lot in common with the stereotypical romance-obsessed, drama queen teen girl trope. Think Mabel from Gravity Falls and her search for romance, being flirty, and dreaming about “typical” things for this age group like swooning over teen stars and whatever cute stuff she can get her hands on despite her economic place in the hemospectrum; and then you’ll have a good start with understanding how Dipala acts. And all parties involved with her for an extended period of time, whether at an acquaintance level or an actual friend/platonic enemy should expect to eventually receive an embarrassing nickname and teasing to a certain varying degree. But heaven help anyone who she could potentially get romantically involved with… because they’ll be getting more than one of those. And if one isn’t cool with that? Yeah, with Dipala that ain’t happening. She is exceptionally persistent and stubborn not only with her treatment with others; but with her pursuit of her hobbies, or trying multiple times to improve her psychic powers. Much like her trollhandle implies, you could probably look up the word “gadfly” in a dictionary and see her face right next to the definition. And if she wasn’t under gadfly, your second best bet would be to look under “hypocrite”. She may find the idea of knowing a ton of damaging or private information; but loathes people snooping around her stuff. Like if you wanted to know the answer you’re looking for why didn’t you just ask her, dear? Snooping around behind her back is so rude! She worked really hard to figure these things out, you jerk! Dipala is as excited to help people as she is equally excited to maybe screw someone over socially….. or just be incredibly apathetic for the sake of figuring out why someone acts the way they do or what’s going on with their lives. If they’re a lowblood they can deal with the hate because others around her own caste deal with this all the time! And highbloods are just rich, bloodthirsty, sometimes well dressed and dreamy, drama-filled sources for intrigue or for a few shits and giggles that she objectifies to a degree. She can make a few exceptions in regards to the people she is closest to, or if the person in question is bribing or making some sort of deal with her. But other than that it is all secrets and info is on the table. I’d describe her take on the hemospectrum as a really odd mix between everyone’s least favorite Hiveswap shitlord Zebruh and Daraya Jonjet. She glorifies the violent culture highbloods propagate because she finds it to be really entertaining to learn about and pry into. Kind of like how we would or others would watch petty reality TV shows and controversial government scandals for. Highbloods also tend to be more “attractive” due to their easy access to material goods and whatnot to do so in the first place. But like Daraya, she is a little frustrated that despite all she does she can’t really do too much. So Dipala takes it upon herself emotionally to make the life she wants and to have fun while she can. But she would suppose and sometimes feel that being so low isn’t too bad. As the possibility that highbloods never really expect any low ranking troll to be this conniving. Like most every normal living thing, of course she doesn’t want to die a terrible death. But life is technically short for every Alternian to some degree. If she’s culled for having a grand old time that’s your problem. Your loss for killing a potentially good informant or loyal adherent of the empire!

There’s so much going on here that it’s hard to comment on any one particular part, but you’ve definitely put a lot of love and thought into her personality and it shows! She’s a really well-rounded character and I love that.

Lunar Sway: Prospit! Even though she has what could be considered a rebellious personality. She’s more of a sneaky “adapt to the environment” kinda gal given her interests and how she goes about her life. Hopefully I’m interpreting the moons correctly?

I think she’s definitely a prospitan. Prospit folks can rebel just as well as dersites, they just tend to, as you say, do it adaptively instead of destructively. She’s also reactive and prone to being somewhat capricious and she’s intuitive, emotional. The one prospitan thing she doesn’t have so much of is the ‘openness,’ but even then she’s also not like a Hides Herself Wholly kind of gal. Prospit all the way.

Title: Witch of Void. Witches “rebel” their aspect from what I understand from a couple of classpect blogs. So Dipala “rebels” in a sense to the idea that things should be secrets or mystery and is just. In everyone’s beeswax whether they allowed her to or not. ALSO since Equius in canon had trouble being detected and created a void around him ((which was why scratch couldn’t find his cue ball, as Vriska was his neighbor)); I thought it fit that Dipala has the Void aspect given her shadiness and inability to be found by those who would probably really want to find or suspect her. I also thought Void worked because it is connected to the Furthest Ring in the medium. More ring-theme references aplenty!

I also like the idea of her messing with the void and the horrorterrors beyond for information; only to be knocked down a shit-ton of pegs because her mind wouldn’t be able to process the “truths” or information they would potentially tell her about Sgrub goings-on, her planet’s quest or things that a 15 year old would never be able to comprehend like most people who encounter incomprehensible things. And eventually it would help her understand that somethings are not meant to be known before one is ready; and that spilling secrets is not only a bad thing for Dipala to do; but it could put those she learns or cares about into trouble they might not want to partake in. Given her mischievous personality, really fucking creepy behavior, and Alternian upbringing it’d be quite a while for the classpect to stamp it out entirely but… hope springs eternal. However I could very well be completely wrong and inaccurate with giving her this classpect too!

I dunno where the “rebel” thing came from. I think most people read too much into Rose’s inversion and imagine that this means something grander about Witches than it really does. Does Jade “rebel” space? Does Feferi “rebel” life? Does Damara “rebel” time? Nope! (And really I’m not even sure what that would mean in the context of any of these). They all just have an intimate understanding of their opposite aspect that they use to inform their decisions wrt their Own aspect. Witches are (at least in this blog’s common interpretation) the active Changers.

They twist and shape and change things to fit their needs and their understanding. Just like Jade changes the size of planets and bends space around her and Feferi used her in with the horrorterrors to change the nature of life itself by creating the dreambubbles.

So a Witch of Void is going to change what is and isn’t hidden, which I DO still think fits Dipala here decently well. But I almost think she could be a… Thief of Void? Not to accidentally call upon that old Vriska worry, because the motive is wholly different. It’s just that her digging is in fact self-serving and she steals secrecy away from everyone else to hide herself. Of course, this COULD hurt her by encouraging her already bad traits, so maybe Rogue of Void might be the way to go if you want to encourage her to be more considerate of others. That Passive Player Life.

Land: Land of Pits and Golems or LOPAG. Dipala has to use her void-y powers to make sure her consorts and denizen don’t learn any of the secrets of these giant dangerous golem super weapons that lurk in ancient pits and ruins across her planet. Since I’m unsure if Dipala will still remain a Void player after this review; I’m keeping the description of the land short and sweet on purpose.

Sounds good to me!

Design corner: At first glance I was worried that her design read too… I don’t know, Trying To Be Teal, but honestly the more I’ve looked at it the more I think it works for her. That bronze Creature Comfort thing shines through and it fits well with her kind of romanticization of high blood life. This could be one of those things where she saved up a ton of money for a long time just to buy a particular cute jean jacket just because an influencer advertised it to her. Or she bought it on Troll Wish. it’s fine. But yeah I like her look! I’d rethink the yellow eye since it dos call to mind the goldblood thing, but otherwise no changes.

Thanks in advance for my reviewing my fantroll! I look forward to seeing your verdict whenever that may be! 👍

Thank you for your submission, I had a great time with this one!

-CD

#brownblood #bronzeblood #submission #review #cd review #spritefright #dipala venmor #dipala #venmor

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stolligaseptember · 6 years

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shenannygans replied to your post “okay, just because i’m literally freaking out over the scope of this...”

I‘d love to read an in depth explanation why it isn‘t real. What I saw so far seems real to me and tbh I‘m really worried.

This is article 13. This is the article that everyone is (apparently) freaking out over.

I personally think that the hysteria that has been spreading is because of a very delicate mix of the far-right and the anti establishment hijacking the American net neutrality movement to push for their own agendas, a misguided SJW culture that’s way too America-centered here on tumblr, and just a general misunderstanding of how the EU works.

(Remember how the first thing that most britts googled after the EU referendum was “what is EU”? Yeah, it’s a bit like that.)

So, being upfront and transparent about this; I really don’t care about if you think the ideas being presented up in article 13 is horrible or whatever, because I personally haven’t really decided on it yet. What I want to set straight is that the apocalyptic death of “the European net neutrality” isn’t what article 13, or the directive on copyright in the Digital Single Market, is about.

Now, I know that EU and its bureaucracy is a literal hellscape. I’m a law student, and I’ve studied 15 points of EU and constitutional law, and 10 points of international law, and it wasn’t until I studied intentional law (2 years later) that the EU law finally started settling for me. (And from the sound of it; for the rest of my classmates too.)

So I know that the EU is complicated and stupid and that they don’t make it easier for themselves, but I just want everyone to know that the EU isn’t the life-sucking demons that the far-right is painting them up to be. They can be a massive pain in the ass, but they aren’t an all-powerful despotic.

And here’s why;

So starting with the basics of the overall law making process in the EU; Article 13 comes from a directive. It’s often been compared to GDPR, which is, weird, but also understandable, seeing how big of an impact GDPR had. But GDPR had such a huge impact because it was a regulation.

There’s two different ways the EU makes laws; through directives and regulations. Regulations, like GDPR, are directly applicable on all member states, are directly incorporated into member states’ national law systems, and can be directly plead for by EU citizens. Hence the huge impact.

Directives, on the other hand, are frame regulations with goals set up by the EU, and then it’s up to each and every member state to incorporate the directive into their national law systems and make sure that those goals are met. That is why the wall of text up there is a literal hot mess that makes little to no sense; it’s because it sets up a framework of what the EU wants to accomplish, then it’s up to the member states to come with their own solutions of how they want to accomplish that.

So, unlike GDPR, the copyright directive isn’t going to change the internet overnight once it’s voted through. It’s going to have to go through several different national law procedures, with various different outcomes, which could take years and, in some cases, might not even change anything at all.

(There are ways in which directives can be directly applicable for EU citizens, but then it has to be battled out through the EU court, so let’s make a noise if it comes to that, then, shall we?)

So you can’t fight this at an EU level. I mean, I guess you can, but be honest with yourself, did you even vote in the EU parliament election? Do you even know who’s representing you in the EU parliament? Do you even know what the EU parliament is, or what it does?

If you want to fight this, it would be so much more effective to do it on a national level.

First of all, depending on which member state you live in, this might not even effect you. The most common procedure when it comes to directives is that the national parliament/government looks at the goals the directive sets up, goes “lol ya our national laws already live up to this” (even if the national laws doesn’t live up to the directive, because, honestly, no one really gives that much of a damn, and the commission has too much to do to keep track of all the directives they spew out), and then everyone goes on with their lives.

But let’s say that your government would actually take measures to incorporate the directive into your national law system. Now, the law procedures are different in every country, but unless you live in a quasi-democracy (looking at you Hungary. And Poland.), you as a citizen, or at the very least an association of citizens, get to have a say in the matter.

They will most likely draft their own proposal of how the directive will be incorporated into your national law, and then you can take a stand if the change is for something good or bad. Call all your national politicians, twitter bomb them, whatever floats your boat. But the directive isn’t going to actually affect you until it reaches the national level.

The European net neutrality is not going to be killed over a night through a directive.

First of all, because that’s not how a directive works, and second, the EU doesn’t have that kind of power, even if they wanted to.

The EU is an odd bird in the international community. It has its own, unique way of operating, and it’s the only “semi-above” association of nations so far in the world. But it’s still an association of nations, and the union’s entire basis is the surrendering of sovereignty from each member state. And while that scope of sovereignty is a constant battle between the union and its member states, that sovereignty still always originate in the member states.

And no member state has surrendered enough power to allow the EU to censor the entire internet.

Copyright laws are also so weird. Like, I can’t speak for any other country, but in Sweden we already have copyright protection for every human made creation. It’s already forbidden by Swedish law to use others copyrighted material without their consent. (We’re one of the countries that would most likely just go “lol ya our national laws already live up to this” if the directive was passed.)

But copyright laws are so incredibly futile.

In Sweden we have laws forbidding piracy copying of just about everything. Still I can (illegally) stream countless of episodes of my favorite TV series, and movies, and music, and download pictures left and right, and no one really bats an eyelash. It’s a shitty thing to do, yeah, sure, and the copyright holder has every right to chew me out over it.

But the point still stands; we already have regulations of it, but nothing really happens.

Copyright infringement is simply too big of a problem, and not acute enough, to be solved. Like, yeah, it’s shitty downloading copyrighted material, but it’s a little more urgent to actually pay attention to our collapsing environment and the impending third world war.

So copyright regulations are statement regulations. They tell us that “yeah, this is a shitty thing to do, please don’t do it”, and then most of us do it anyway. Because a proper sanction system isn’t in place. And it’s most likely going to take a hell of a long time before it does, if it ever.

And it’s not going to come from the EU.

Because then there was the goddamn “link tax”. I just. Oh god.

First of all, “link tax” is the literal worst name to use, because the EU is outright and strictly forbidden to deal with taxes. That’s one sovereignty posts that absolutely no member state is willing to give up. The EU has nothing to do with taxes whatsoever.

So again, this would be dealt with and regulated on a national level. Even if it would be a tax or a fee, it would go to the national economy, and not to the EU. The EU is directly funded by the member states budgets (which they are actually discussing right now, tbh), import duties (because while the EU has no right to deal with taxes, import duties are an entirely different matter because of the inner market), and fines from when you don’t follow EU regulations (which, once again, the commission is way above their ears trying to sort out (hello Sweden’s continuous refusal to become a part of the Euro)).

So if the “link tax” would in any way end up benefiting the EU, it would be through a fine, which would only happen if your member state refused to incorporate the directive. Which is a long way to go, and tbh, isn’t that likely.

And as you can see above, article 13 doesn’t mention a “link tax”, or links, or taxes, and neither does the rest of the directive.

So, no, the EU isn’t gonna make you pay for linking stuff. That’s ridiculous.

And you wanted an in-depth explanation of why that fucking video isn’t real, and I barely even touched the video and haven’t even started going through what article 13 even says, but I’ve already talked my own ear of and this probably makes no sense so. Don’t be afraid to ask me more-head-on questions, and I’ll try to answer them as best as I can!!

Just. Don’t freak out. The internet is safe, for a good long while still, no matter what happens to the directive once its voted on on June 20th.

The memes are still safe.

#shenannygans #article 13 #storytelling september #swearing tw

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thesydneyfeminists · 6 years

Text

The Crimes of JK Rowling

CW: racism, homophobia, mentions of abuse and drugs.

The cool thing about growing up and expanding your world view is that you eventually see your childhood heroes for what they are. Flawed humans (and maybe, just plain assholes). First Joss Whedon and now JK Rowling. Nothing is sacred and no one is safe.

I loved the Harry Potter series (the original seven books, I refuse to accept any of the latest garbage she’s put out/had her name attached to – within the HP universe) and I still count Prisoner of Azkaban as one of my favourite books, but even fondness and nostalgia can’t shield JK Rowling from some of the problems with the world she has created, the way she explains/defends it, and her quarter assed (not even half) and damaging attempts to rectify that now in 2018.

Note: Simply for length reasons, these are all related to the Harry Potter/Fantastic Beasts franchises.

Crime One: Racism

It’s no great secret that there are very few characters of colour in the Harry Potter universe. Apparently, while it’s plausible that there’s a whole (not so) secret world of magic, it’s just too unbelievable for there to be many witches or wizards of colour. Before you come at me with “but Vee, mudbloods and Voldemort only wanting pureblood wizards is a metaphor for racism!” you can stop that right now. Because you know what’s also a great metaphor for racism? Actual racism. How about how people of colour are literally discriminated against every single day. They get passed over for jobs, they’re spat at in the streets, they’re being killed by police. Metaphors for racism? Not good enough.

I’m in the camp that think white writers shouldn’t write their main character as anything other than white, for a whole host of reasons, but if I had to summarize it, I think stories of colour should be told by authors of colour, we should be opening the doors for more authors of colour, we should listen to their voices, their stories, their experiences. I think white authors can’t know the exact nuances of what it’s like to be a person of colour, how the world treats us, the experience of living in diaspora, the disconnect between first gen, second gen and third gen family members, and so much more. It’s something that sure, you can read about it, you can do your research, but you’ll never quite understand it unless you’ve lived it. All of that being said, I do believe that white authors can include characters of colour in a meaningful way, that is, not for decoration, not as a handy plot device to move your story along, and not as a harmful, disgusting stereotype. But let’s stop for a second and count the number of background characters of colour that have been more or less confirmed (note that Hermione could easily be coded black, the only hint we get is in PoA, she’s described as “very brown”, but it’s not until the older Hermione was cast with a black actress in The Cursed Child did JK pop up and say “of course she could be black!”). So, we have Lee Jordan (maybe unfairly assumed, as he’s only described as having dreadlocks but he was cast with a POC), Dean Thomas (who was very good at drawing – also maybe unfairly listed, was cast with a POC), Parvati and Padma Patil (possibly unfairly listed, described as having long black hair, and cast with POC), Cho Chang (quickly, can I point out that a character of Asian descent being sorted into Ravenclaw the “smart house” plays into so many racist stereotypes that I can barely breathe), Kingsley Shacklebolt, Blaise Zambini. And then, well, there’s Nagini.

Tweet reads: “The Naga are snake-like mythical creatures of Indonesian mythology, hence the name ‘Nagini.’ They are sometimes depicted as winged, sometimes as half-human, half-snake. Indonesia comprises a few hundred ethnic groups, including Javanese, Chinese and Betawi. Have a lovely day.”

About a week ago, the trailer for Fantastic Beasts 2: The Crimes of Grindelwald was dropped to mixed reactions. The trailer revealed a snippet that reveals that Voldemort’s pet snake was once a shapeshifting woman, cursed to become trapped in a snake’s body. An Asian shapeshifting woman. Reduced to becoming (a white supremacist but metaphorically) a white man’s pet. Cool. Naturally, there was some backlash about this turn of events, and so JK tried to tweet out the reasoning and explanation (while also saying she’d been keeping this racist secret for 20 years) that obviously Nagini had to be an Asian woman because it was based on a creature from Indonesian mythology, and that Indonesia comprised a “few hundred ethnic groups, including Javanese, Chinese and Betawi”. Cool, JK, but the actress cast is Korean, and you saying all of this kind of reinforces the idea that all Asian ethnicities are interchangeable. Let’s not even get into a white woman explaining Indonesian mythology or ethnicity, or the fact that it’s also an Indian mythology, the Naga. I don’t want to split hairs here, there are other examples of mythology that are similar but have key differences across other cultures (the kitsune/kumiho/huli jing fox spirit, for one). So it’s possible she only read up on the Indonesian myth and took her inspiration from there. But the way she “explained” the debacle sits uneasily with me. She brushes over any concerns that come from people of colour – valid concerns and questions, and instead chooses to ignore the real issue, which is that by playing into the harmful stereotype that Asian women are subservient, and that all of the different Asian ethnicities are interchangeable, she does more harm than good for inclusivity and that she is doing it for show. She doesn’t give a shit if her work includes characters of colour, and if it does, she doesn’t give a shit that they’re shitty stereotypes, 2D characters that are nothing more than the colour of their skin, just there to boost the POC count in her works.

Thinly veiled racism? Guilty.

Crime Two: Poor Handling of LGBT+ Issues/People

Back in 2007, speaking to a crowd of fans at an event at Carnegie Hall, JK Rowling revealed that she “always thought of Dumbledore as gay” to wild applause. Finally, a canon character was more or less confirmed as LGBT+ (sorry to the Dracarry shippers, that still just lives in our hearts). Great, right? Except, why did she wait until the book series was completed to come out with this revelation? Why didn’t she include it in the books? Sure, you might say “well, Vee, it’s a kids book, you’re expecting far too much” except it’s not a “kids book”, it’s always very clearly been in the young adult category (certainly after the third book, at least) and readership has always been split between adults and younger people. The series came out when I was a teenager, finishing when I was 21, and I definitely would have appreciated some LGBT+ representation in a book that meant so much to so many people. I’m not saying she needed to include a sex scene in there (she could’ve faded to black, like Stephenie Meyer did in Breaking Dawn) but to go back and retcon that Dumbledore was gay and that she’d always thought that, for it to ring true, she needed to leave us hints in the original series. She “always thought of Dumbledore as gay” but “didn’t feel the need to spell it out”. Maybe she didn’t see the point of it, maybe she didn’t want to spoil her “big reveal” (note that some fans had always suspected that Dumbledore had been in love with Grindelwald), but by not mentioning it until after the fact? It comes off as lazy, or as wanting to appeal to the LGBT+ community, by trying to earn an ally card by doing very little at all.

Tweet reads: “I was asked whether Lupin’s treatment by others could be seen as a metaphor for (then) stigmatised conditions. I agreed that it could. 2/4” J.K. Rowling (@jk_rowling)

Then there’s the Lupin issue. Supposedly, at some point in 1999, JK was asked whether or not Lupin’s “condition could be seen as a metaphor for (then) stigmatised conditions” and she said it could. Basically, lycanthropy is meant to be a metaphor for HIV/AIDS in the HP universe. In Short Stories From Hogwarts of Heroism, Hardship, and Dangerous Hobbies (released 2016, mind you), JK writes “Lupin’s condition of lycanthropy was a metaphor for those illnesses that carry a stigma, like HIV and AIDS. All kinds of superstitions seem to surround blood-borne conditions, probably due to taboos surrounding blood itself. The wizarding community is as prone to hysteria and prejudice as the Muggle one, and the character of Lupin gave me a chance to examine those attitudes”. Maybe she had the best intentions in mind when she came up with that idea, and true enough, blood and blood purity does matter to an extent in the wizarding world, but something about it feels hollow and gross. I’d like to note here that we only meet three werewolves in the series (Lupin, Greyback and an unnamed man who was bitten) and none of them were female. Take that how you will, but a few fans came to the conclusion that her “metaphor for HIV/AIDS” also includes the harmful stereotype that gay men were going out and maliciously infecting over men with HIV.

Retconning the source material to make herself seem LGBT+ inclusive but handling it terribly? Guilty.

Crime Three: White Feminism

Maybe this crime really explains the others. It explains her support of the decision to cast Johnny Depp in the Fantastic Beasts film series. Yep, Johnny Depp, you know, the guy who physically abused (then-wife) Amber Heard. Sure, he’d been cast before we knew about that. He’d appeared, for five whole minutes in the end of the first Fantastic Beasts film, so he’d already signed on. Surely, he couldn’t be fired when his contract was signed. Except, we’ve seen examples of men accused of abuse being let go from their jobs (not often, but it happens sometimes). Kevin Spacey, for one. So, why couldn’t Grindelwald be recast? Especially after a five minute cameo at the end of a movie? JK Rowling released a statement where she acknowledges that around the time of filming the first movie in the new franchise, stories involving Depp’s abuse of Heard started to appear in the press, and “based on our understanding of the circumstances, the filmmakers and I are not only comfortable sticking with our original casting, but genuinely happy to have Johnny playing a major character in the movies.” Comfortable and genuinely happy to have a known abuser affiliated with your work, based on our understanding of the circumstances, the circumstances being that Depp physically abused Amber Heard, who provided photo and video evidence. Even Daniel Radcliffe has spoken out about the decision to let Depp remain on cast, given the decision to fire a lesser known actor (Jamie Waylett) from HP: Deathly Hallows pt 2 after his arrest for growing 10 marijuana plants (he was later arrested for a more serious crime, but that was well after his firing from Harry Potter). DanRad mentioned how he was, of course, thankful for the opportunities provided to him from being cast as Harry Potter, but that “I suppose the thing I was struck by was, we did have a guy who was reprimanded for weed on the (original Potter) film, essentially, so obviously what Johnny has been accused of is much greater than that.”

Tweet reads: “Just unfollowed a man whom I thought was smart and funny, because he called Theresa May a whore. 1/14” J.K. Rowling (@jk_rowling)

Of course, supporting the casting of an abusive man doesn’t make her a white feminist, nor does tweeting about unfollowing a man for calling Theresa May a whore. What does, in my honest opinion, is her handling of any criticism she receives, and the bullshit way in which she tries to earn her ally card, but only when it suits her. If all of this mattered so much, she would’ve included it the first time around. Retconning her source material in an effort to appear more diverse isn’t true diversity. It’s literally a made up world, she could’ve made it more diverse from the start. She needed to explicitly state things, because marginalised groups need to see representation. Good, strong, representation. Not weak and harmful versions. By being properly inclusive in her material, as a middle class white woman, she could’ve set an example of how things should be. If she’d spoken to any marginalised group, heard their stories, about their lives, gained an insight in how to write about them, her POC, LGBTQIA+, lower class, etc audiences would’ve come away with the message that she cared and wanted them included in her stories. In her world.

The bottom line is, JK Rowling does not care enough to follow through, and well, when you’ve made as much money as she has, why should she? She bangs on about how truly diverse the wizarding world was and gives examples to back it up, but she does so way too late, and without any real proof, just her word. Sure, she created this universe, maybe she did believe Dumbledore was gay, or Hermione could be black, but she needed to say it back then, not ten years later when people are critical of the cis-het white world she’d created. She rants about men immediately calling women names when they disagree with them, prides herself on blocking and unfollowing these men, but when called out about supporting the casting of a known abuser? She suddenly no longer cares about supporting another woman. One who was arguably, treated a little worse than just name calling. Her idea of feminism is clouded by her life experience, which would be fine if she took the time to listen to the people around her, from different backgrounds, and try to understand why they feel what she says and does is offensive, clumsy, and lazy. But when her opinion and her views challenged, she comes out swinging, blocking people, throwing around statements like “Dumbledore is gay!” or “Hermione is black!” as a clumsy attempt to appease the very people she does not give a shit about. The solution is laughably simple, all she would have to do is just listen to marginalised voices. Hear their stories and educate herself. And if she truly wanted to be a true intersectional feminist, she would do it. Understanding her privilege would cost her nothing. In fact, it would garner her more respect, something she’s lost a lot of in the last few years.

Just say you don’t care, JK, it’s more honest. Guilty, guilty, guilty.

By: Vee H

Sources:

Twitter

https://www.pinknews.co.uk/2016/09/08/jk-rowling-reveals-remus-lupins-werewolf-condition-metaphor-for-hiv/

https://www.jkrowling.com/opinions/grindelwald-casting/

https://ew.com/movies/2018/01/12/daniel-radcliffe-johnny-depp-fantastic-beasts/

#jk rowling #Harry Potter #Fantastic beasts #feminist review #feminist #Nagini #racism #white feminism #JK rowling's racism

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theteaisaddictive · 6 years

Note

oooh how about... Florist AU and Green-Eyed Epiphany?

this is straight-up just the confession scene from jane eyre, but modern femslash. enjoy!

Jane fiddles with the ribbon, trying to get it lying perfectly flat. It’s a garish shade of purple, which honestly reminds her more of Cadbury’s than anything else, but it’s what Rochester wanted. The aquilegia droops threateningly low, and she gently forces the stalks further down into the water. The whole bouquet is a mix of purples, greens, and yellows, which honestly surprises Jane; she’d privately thought that Rochester had better taste than that. Of course, it’s not like Jane is one to talk; the only reason she’s front-of-house at all, and not doing the books like she was hired to do, is because Mrs. Fairfax is off sick.

The aquilegia no longer in danger of spilling out the front of this monstrosity of a flower arrangement, Jane sidles back behind the cash register, drumming her fingers absently on the counter. It’s a Thursday evening and Thornfield Florists officially closed two minutes ago, so she sidles over to the door and flips the sign (which, funnily enough, she also helped to design. Graphic design isn’t exactly her passion, but it helped pay bills here and there. It was positively serendipitous that she was working with a previous client; Jane knew the importance of networking very well). She takes out her book, a brick-sized copy of Jonathan Strange and Mr Norrell, and begins reading more of the dense material. It was a recommendation from Adele, and while Jane didn’t normally take book recs from anybody (least of all her boss’s daughter), she was forced to admit that Adele had accurately gauged her taste.

The little bell jingles as the door swings open.

“Sorry, we’re closed,” Jane starts, quickly setting the book aside, but she cuts herself off when she sees who it is. “Oh, Rochester. About time.”

“I’m so sorry,” she says, unwinding her steel-grey scarf and setting it carelessly on the hatstand near the counter. “There was a huge traffic rush, and Adele’s Parent’s Night was running late, and on top of that –”

“It’s alright, Rochester,” she chuckles. “I was only teasing.”

A flash of a smile sparks a jolt of electricity in Jane’s heart, and Rochester sags against the window. Her fringe falls into her eyes; it’s been needing a cut for roughly three weeks, but with the season Thornfield has nobody’s had time to do anything normal. Hence, Jane doing customer service when she is, in fact, in charge of making sure that all their stock is where it needs to be. “You have an exceptional poker face,” she continues, brushing the hair away. “It’s positively dangerous.”

“I suppose it’s a good thing I don’t play poker, then,” Jane says. As soon as the words are out of her mouth she feels a sting of guilt. She’d had a stern mental talk with herself the whole way back from Gateshead; flirting with your coworker is a bad idea. Flirting with your boss is even worse. Flirting with your probably-already-engaged boss who has a seven-year-old kid, and who keeps asking you to make flower arrangements for her fiancé? A terrible idea. And yet, Jane keeps doing it; when Rochester looks at her the way she is right now, it’s impossible for Jane to stop playing whatever game is between them.

Rochester chuckles again, the white of her teeth almost shocking underneath her blood-red lips, and Jane melts, like she always does. “It’s funny, seeing you in makeup,” she says without thinking.

“Oh? Like at the Christmas party a while back, with the sad spirit?”

Jane simply stares at Rochester, and she obediently cuts the bullshit. That Christmas party still haunts Jane, sometimes; the strange lights and sound effects Rochester had strung up in the library, and the sudden appearance of the Victorian ghost who claimed to see into everybody’s souls. It had just been Rochester playing a trick, of course, and Jane hadn’t … hadn’t really fallen for it.

“I don’t know,” Jane says, focusing on Rochester now. “You seem … sharper around the edges.”

She hums thoughtfully. “I feel that way myself.” She fiddles with her fingers for a moment, and darts a glance up at Jane. “But you – you’re sharp enough without needing eyeliner or lipstick to kill a man.” Jane lets out a half-smile at the reference, but Rochester still seems dejected. “Are you sharp enough to know where the wind is blowing?”

Oh. So it’s time for this talk.

“So it’s true? You’re marrying Bran Ingram?” It’s too confrontational and Jane knows it, but she can’t stop herself.

“I suppose so,” Rochester says. “We’ll merge the shop with his business, and his workers will take charge. I’ve found other places for you and Mrs Fairfax, although if you don’t want to take it I understand.”

Jane looks down at the ground. The floor needs swept; green leaves and half-dead flower cuttings are all over the floor. “Where?” she asks, with a steadier voice than she imagined.

“Ireland,” Rochester says.

Jane’s head flies up. “Ireland!” she repeats. “But – but that’s so far away! From – from England, and Thornfield, and – you.” Her voice breaks on the last word, and she turns away from Rochester so that she can’t see the tears forming in Jane’s eyes.

“It’s funny,” Rochester says, and how is her voice so calm right now? “But I’ve had a strange feeling for a few months now – that there’s a sort of connection between us. A little string between our two hearts. And if we wander too far away from each other, it’ll just snap in two; I have a feeling that I’d take to bleeding inwardly.” Jane hears her take a step towards her. “As for you,” she says, her voice somehow hollow, “you’d forget me.”

And that thought, that she could just forget Rochester, makes Jane spin around in righteous fury, hot tears coursing down her cheeks. “Forget you! How could I forget you?” Rochester takes a half-step back, her hands palm-up to Jane in a gesture of self-defence, but she seizes Rochester by the wrists to stop her. “You’re the most intelligent, single-minded, infuriating woman I’ve ever met! Nobody I’ve known has come close to you and no one ever will, and you think I’ll forget you?” Rochester must be in pain from the vice-like grip Jane has on her wrists, but she doesn’t move. “I don’t know what the fuck you think you’re doing, but whatever this is between us,” and she shakes Rochester’s wrists for emphasis, “it doesn’t happen to me. I don’t think it happens to you, either.”

Rochester’s eyes are just a disc of grey around her dilated pupils, and she gasps out, “You’re right.”

“About?”

“My feelings for you. They’re real, and true; probably the truest thing about me, I swear to god.”

“Don’t – don’t mock me,” Jane says flatly.

“Jane –”

“I knew – I knew you were flirting with me, I’m not completely dense, but you don’t have – have feelings for me, and to say that you do is fucking low.” Her breath comes quickly, and Jane can feel her temper, that long-dormant thing, begin to stir within her chest. “I’m not some – some puzzle, or fucking MPDG fantasy – and just because I’m not some tall, thin, leggy blonde doesn’t mean I don’t have my pride!” She’s crying again, to her eternal humiliation, and Rochester is looking at her like she cares about Jane’s emotional state, which is just – ridiculous. “So you know what,” she says, dropping Rochester’s wrists, “why don’t you just go back to Bran, and marry him, and be perfectly fucking happy together?”

“I don’t want to marry Bran, for fuck’s sake!” Rochester shouts. “I don’t give a single solitary fuck about Bran, I’m in love with you, Jane!” She lunges for Jane’s hand, presses it against her racing heart. “I swear, Jane, I wasn’t trying to hurt you – I’m a fucking idiot, you know that. Everybody knows that, but you’re the only one who pushes me to be better! You call me out on my bullshit. You make me laugh. You make me happy,” she says, her voice breaking. “I’ve been in love with you the moment you saved me from burning to death in my own bed, Jane.”

Jane grabs Rochester’s shoulder. “Come under here; under the light.” Rochester obediently goes where she’s prodded, although her fingers still form a strong manacle around Jane’s wrist. The shitty overhead light (Thornfield Florists is largely dependent on natural light) casts an orange glow over Rochester’s striking features, but does nothing to disprove the earnestness over her face. “Jane?” she says quietly.

“Let go of me, please,” she replies, equally softly. “I’m not a bird. I’m not going to fly away.”

Rochester drops Jane’s hand. She keeps it on Rochester’s chest, feeling her hammering heart, the expansion of her lungs as she breathes. Her thumb brushes the inside curve of her breast. Rochester sucks in a breath at the movement, but otherwise doesn’t move.

“You love me?” Jane asks quietly.

“With all my heart,” Rochester replies.

Jane reaches up for her neck, gently tugging Rochester’s head down. Their lips meet, and Jane presses herself fully against Rochester’s body. Her hands splay across Jane’s back as she crushes Jane to her, opening her mouth to the gentle investigation of Jane’s tongue. Rochester gasps, a harsh sound in the otherwise silent shop.

“I love you too, Rochester,” she murmurs against her lips.

“Ebba,” she says between short, light kisses. “Please. Call me Ebba.”

“Ebba,” Jane sighs, and Rochester groans as Jane takes her earlobe between her teeth.

The next morning, they find that a lightning storm had split apart the old oak tree at the bottom of Rochester’s garden.

#asks #demoisellebeauty #jane eyre #otp: lightning tree #my fanfic #*tosses this in your general direction* TAKE MY GARBAGE AND GO #rote's name isn't a misspelling btw just before anyone asks #also i didnn't really touch on it in the fic but jane's eyes are green that's why this is jane eyre specifically

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ughkeery · 6 years

Text

two strangers learn to fall in love again | steve harrington

request: hey! i was wondering if i could request a college AU where you meet steve and become super close? bonus points if the reader is like half asleep and bumps into him the first time they see each other! the rest is up to however you wanna make it :)

word count: 3.6k

warning(s): none tbh

a/n: this was extremely fun to write so thank you to whoever requested this??? there’s not much else i can say since i don’t wanna spoil anything so... hope y’all enjoy!

You’re not sure what’s worse about the guy living underneath you: his horrible taste in music, or the fact that he plays it loud enough for the entire building to hear.

“Does the guy in Room 202 listen to anything other than Journey lately?” You ask, half-venting and half-expecting an actual response from your roommate, Lisa. The two of you are on your respective twin beds, pretending to study for finals until midnight strikes because that’s when the two of you vowed you’d call it a night and go to bed.

“Who?” Lisa mutters, although her eyes are still glued to the textbook in her lap.

“Room 202.” The term rolls off your tongue with such disdain that Lisa looks up at you in surprise.

You’ve never actually met him, but you’ve passed by his dorm here and there on your way to a few parties. Each time he was blaring the exact same contrived, top-forty-hits type garbage that you’ve recently come to know more and love less.

You didn’t mind it so much at the beginning of the year - back when Room 202 only rocked out on the weekends and you weren’t in the dorms very much to begin with. But now that it’s been happening nearly every night for the past month, he’s on your very last nerve.

“How do you know it’s not a girl?” Lisa wonders, amused by your exasperation.

“Because, what kind of self-respecting woman would hang Van Halen posters on the outside of her door?”

“Yeah, thank God he moved on from his hard rock phase.” Lisa closes her textbook and tosses it aside. It’s only 10:30, but you’re too distracted and angered by the sound of Steve Perry’s voice to call her out on it.

You fall into your pillow with an overly dramatic sigh, watching your breath ruffle the pages of your Biology notebook resting on the bed beside you.

“My mother was right. I should’ve never signed up to live in a co-ed dorm.”

Lisa rolls her eyes. “Have you talked to the RA about it?”

“Four times,” you mutter.

“Have you talked to him about it?”

“What do you mean?”

She shrugs. “I just figure that if it pisses you off so much, you would have no problem knocking on his door and telling him to keep it down.”

Your fingers, which have been absently flipping through the pages of your Biology notes, come to a stop as you ponder over Lisa’s suggestion. She knows how much you dislike confrontation, but you would be doing the entire dorm a service by being the one to finally make Room 202 shut up once and for all. Perhaps it would be worth it.

“Winter break is in a week,” You say, justifying your nervousness more to yourself than Lisa. “What’s the point?”

“Winter break is only a month long. Once we come back in January, you’ll be back at square one.”

“True. And who knows what kind of shitty music will come out by then?”

You sigh, slouching further into your bed as Room 202 makes the audible switch from Journey to Phil Collins. Better, but not great, you think.

“Still, I don’t think it’s the best idea,” you continue. “No reason to make any enemies around here, even if it’s with the jerk in Room 202.”

“Whatever. He can get away with it if he wants to,” Lisa says with another shrug. “I hear he’s pretty hot.”

You press your lips together, not from lack of agreement, but because you know that if you get too wrapped up in this conversation you’ll spend even less time studying for your Biology final than you already have. Although you’ve never met the guy, Lisa likes to insist that his rumored good looks make up for his terrible music taste.

You think it’ll take a little more than that. You want to get an actual apology out of him, you decide.

“Fine,” you say after a few moments of silence between the two of you. “I’ll go first thing in the morning.”

As it turns out, morning rolls around more quickly than you initially expected. By the time you’ve reached the peak hours of moonlight, you’re so elbow-deep in stacks of graded quizzes and highlighted notes that you fail to realize just how late it is - that is, until Lisa rolls over in bed with a sour look on her face.

“Go to sleep, Y/N,” she whines, squinting at the yellow light illuminating from the tiny lamp on your desk. “It’s two in the morning.”

“You realize that if I don’t get at least a B on my Biology exam, I’ll fail the course, right?”

“You realize that if you keep me up all night, I’ll kill you, right?”

You roll your eyes, knowing that if you weren’t so overworked and tired you would probably laugh at Lisa’s comeback. Despite how long you’ve spent repeatedly going over the material for your final, there are still some things you’re still completely clueless about. You can’t afford to stop - especially not when your exam is only in six hours.

Leaning back in your chair, you cast a sideways glance at the laundry basket next to your bed, which is currently filled way too far over the edge with socks and sweaters that are threatening to tumble out. With all the studying you’ve been doing this week, getting your laundry done hasn’t even crossed your mind.

Other than the kitchen - which is all the way downstairs - the laundry room would be a nice change of scenery for you to study. It would also ensure that you actually have a clean outfit to wear tomorrow.

“I’ll be back in an hour or so,” you announce, pushing your chair out from your desk, “and hopefully I’ll have all the organelles of the cell memorized by then.”

You can’t hear Lisa’s response muffled into her pillow, but judging by her tone, she’s on the brink of sleep and probably doesn’t even care. You quietly sort out the sweaters you get the most wear out of to wash, grab your Biology supplies, and exit your dorm.

Perhaps it’s the wave of pure exhaustion hitting you, but as you wander down the dimly-lit hallway towards the laundry room, you can’t help but think that you’re in an entirely different place. The dorms - quiet and nearly pitch-black - are almost like a different reality at night. The only other times you’ve been outside your own dorm room this late have been on your way back from parties across campus, full of alcohol and subdued laughter caused by your group of friends.

Get it together, Y/N, you inwardly tell yourself, rounding the corner at the end of the hallway.

Although, you don’t get very far beyond that. Just around the corner is someone else walking in the opposite direction. The minute you two run into each other, you lose your balance and fall flat on your ass.

“Ouch,” you exclaim, unwilling to speak above a whisper so that you don’t awaken any of the sleeping co-eds in the rooms on either side of you. If you were feeling up to it, you would not only speak at full volume, but you would probably also smack the guy that you’ve just run into because damn, that really hurt.

“Holy shit, are you okay?” the guy asks.

“Yeah, I’m -”

Okay, you finish in your head, although for some reason the word fails to leave your lips as you look up at the boy. You don’t use this word lightly, but he is, without a doubt, the most attractive person you’ve ever met. He’s clearly in his pajamas - sweatpants and a t-shirt displaying your school’s mascot - but that only makes him all the more dreamy. You can’t help but feel insecure in your own exhaustive state as he looks right at you, eyes bright and smile contagious.

The cute stranger gives you a smirk that is somehow polite and incredibly endearing. Still bent down in front of you, he holds his hand out, inches from your own. “C’mere, let me help you up.”

Meekly, you slip your hand into his and let him pull you up, rising to your feet with a sigh of relief. Somehow, you managed to keep a steady grip on your Biology supplies and bag of laundry throughout your fall. You clutch them even closer, a defense mechanism under this guy’s impeccably charming gaze.

“I’m Steve Harrington,” he introduces, “and I promise that knocking over pretty girls at two in the morning isn’t one of my main hobbies.”

You tell him your name, and he repeats it back to you amiably, rolling it around in his mouth like it’s familiar to him. The sound of your name being recited from his lips makes you blush like a little girl on the playground interacting with her crush. Thankfully, it’s too dark in the hallway for Steve to notice the hint of pink in your cheeks.

“So, Y/N,” he says, leaning his shoulder against the wall. “What’s a girl like you doing out of your room so late? They have rules around here, you know.”

You grin. Why did I have to meet this guy when I look like an actual zombie?

“My roommate threatened to murder me in cold blood if I didn’t take my studying elsewhere,” you reply, gesturing to the Biology textbook cradled in one of your arms. “How about you?”

“My buddy Scott lives on this floor. He was letting me borrow his Algebra notes,” he explains.

“Ah,” you say coolly, pressing your lips together. “So… what are your main hobbies, Steve Harrington?”

He laughs and runs a hand through his hair. You watch him do so, afraid that he will mess up his perfectly-styled ‘do, but his hair somehow retreats back to its original state afterwards. If it were socially acceptable, you would probably ask him what kind of hairspray he uses.

“Well, right now, failing school seems to be something I’m good at - although, it’s not a hobby I particularly enjoy.” He stuffs his hands in his pockets. “Hence why I needed to borrow Scott’s notes.”

“Scott Miller?” you clarify. Steve nods. “Yeah, he’s in my English lecture. I think he’s the only person in there who’s read every single book. He’s really smart.”

“Scary smart,” Steve agrees, another smile grazing the corners of his lips. “You seem pretty smart yourself.”

“I do?” You blink, unable to keep your eyes from widening.

“Yeah, I mean - a girl willing to sacrifice a good night’s sleep for the sake of school? That takes some willpower. You must be some kind of badass.”

If it were possible, you would blush even harder. You mimic Steve’s stance, leaning against the wall, unable to tear your eyes away from his friendly gaze.

“Not really,” you respond sheepishly. “I wouldn’t be doing it if I weren’t so afraid of how my parents would react if I were to fail Biology.”

“But you won’t fail,” he insists, taking a step closer to you. “Lots of other people would, but Y/N Y/L/N? She’s not a quitter.”

Steve smirks again, and under the hazy light attached to the high ceiling above you, you’re able to make out the dark freckles adorning his face. You aren’t sure why he’s being so nice to you, or why on earth he has to be so damn cute, but you definitely know one thing for sure: you don’t want this conversation to end.

You take your bottom lip between your teeth, unsure of how to respond to Steve in a way that doesn’t make how much you’re taken by his words so obvious.

“Anyways,” Steve says after a few moments of silence, although to you it felt like hours of staring into each other’s eyes. Your heart sinks as he continues.

“I, uh, won’t keep you. Looks like you have a big night ahead of you.” He eyes the items in your hands, smiling softly. “Laundry, Y/N? Really?”

“What can I say? I like to multitask.” You laugh softly.

Steve sets his hand on your arm, big enough for his fingers to wrap around it. But he doesn’t do that - he just gives it a small squeeze, which makes your heart want to burst.

“See you around?” he asks quietly, letting go of your arm as effortlessly as he had held onto it seconds ago.

You swallow the nerves in your throat, nodding, wanting to ask him to buy you an ice cream or take you to a party or just keep talking so you can hear his voice, impossibly comforting for someone you barely know. But for some reason, you can’t muster up the courage to do any of those things until Steve has disappeared down the other end of the hallway.

Your laundry doesn’t get done, and neither does your studying. As calming as Steve Harrington’s words were, the minute you came to terms with the fact that you were alone once again in the dark, dreary hallway, you grew more tired than ever. Passing Biology was important, but in order to do that, you needed a decent amount of sleep for your exam.

However, stuck in a haze over your conversation with Steve, you realize not long after you come back to your dorm that you’ll be unable to focus on anything else - including sleep. In fact, you’ve just managed to force your eyes close and drift off before your alarm clock goes off at seven, signaling the fact that you only have one hour until your exam is set to begin.

“Ugh!” you exclaim, pushing your head underneath your pillow.

Lisa, who has clearly experienced the pleasure of a full-night’s sleep, leans over and turns off the alarm. “Morning, sleepyhead,” she greets, hopping out of bed. “Have fun doing all that laundry last night?”

“Five more minutes,” you whine to nobody in particular, squeezing your eyes shut even tighter. You hear Lisa exit the room - presumably to take a shower - and you can feel yourself drift off again. However, that lasts all of ten seconds when another noise - one that is even more annoying than the sound of your alarm clock - fills your ears.

Van Halen.

Room 202.

“Son of a bitch,” you say with a groan, rubbing your hands over your face until you’ve forced yourself awake. It’s probably the lack of sleep, but Room 202 seems to be playing his music more loudly than he ever has before. The sound of an obnoxiously high-pitched guitar solo echoing throughout your room makes you want to cry, scream, or both.

Instead, you angrily kick the pile of blankets off your freezing legs, change into the only clean clothes you have left, and march downstairs. You probably look like an absolute wreck right now, but if you don’t get as much sleep as you can by the time you need to show up for your exam, who knows what else will happen to your already deteriorating mental health.

You manage to follow the sound all the way to Room 202’s front door. Without hesitation, you begin pounding on the door, eagerly hoping to put a stop to all of this once and for all.

“Hey!” you scream.

But Room 202 doesn’t seem to hear you. The sound of a screeching guitar continues, as unpleasant as ever. You bang your fist even harder, aiming right for Eddie Van Halen’s face on the poster attached to the door.

“Hey!” you scream even louder. “Open up!”

The volume on the song decreases, but not by much. You can see footsteps moving underneath the crack in the door.

“Give me a sec!”

You sigh, placing your hands on your hips impatiently. The song is eventually cut off, and the door swings open just enough for Room 202 to fit through.

But when the guy opens the door, it’s not the rugged, mullet-sporting douchebag you pictured living in Room 202 all this time.

It’s none other than Steve Harrington.

“Hey there, Y/N,” he greets, blinking the sleep and confusion from his eyes.

“Um,” you squeak, unable to form any words through your bewilderment.

“As pleasantly surprised - and somewhat creeped out - as I am that you found out where I live, can I ask what the hell you’re doing here so early?”

Steve seems unphased by your astonishment, or maybe he’s just as tired as you are and doesn’t notice. Still, it has to be fairly obvious that you’re freaking out right now.

“Um,” you say again, trying to look over Steve’s shoulder. “I was… looking for your roommate?”

Maybe the other guy that lives here is the one that plays such awful music each night, you try to reason with yourself. However, that theory is quickly shot down.

“Well, you’re not gonna have any luck.” He chuckles and steps aside, revealing just one bed next to a desk even more cluttered than yours. The layout of his dorm is identical to yours, except that where the other twin bed would be is a fully decked-out turntable with what looks like dozens of records haphazardly thrown on the shelf underneath. Laying face-up on the bed is a worn copy of Van Halen’s latest album.

This can’t be happening. You haven’t had any sleep. You’re delirious. This isn’t real.

There’s no way the Steve Harrington you met last night is the same person you’ve been badmouthing since the beginning of the year.

“I live in a single dorm,” he explains, watching your eyes glaze over his room with an amused smile. “Y/N, if you wanted to come see me, you don’t have to act all coy about it.”

“That’s… not why I’m here.” Steve’s face falls slightly. You realize that you’re standing an awkward distance away from him, but for some reason you can’t will your legs to move even an inch. “I, um…”

You look up at him finally, making eye contact for the first time since the two of you met less than five hours ago. You can tell he’s confused - brows and lips pushed together in an endearing pout - and you can’t really blame him. He probably thinks you’re some kind of stalker; that you followed him back to his room earlier this morning just so you could come over a few hours later.

“Y/N, are you okay?” he says, putting your racing mind to a halt. He cracks the door open a little more, glancing over his shoulder. “Like I said, I’m happy to see you and all, but I need to get ready for -”

“What are you doing tonight?” you blurt out, surprising yourself more than him.

Steve rubs the back of his neck, eyebrows raised in curiosity. “Uh… nothing, I think. Why?”

“We should go record shopping.” You glance at the stack of records in his room again. The majority of them are names you wish you didn’t recognize. “There’s this place right off campus that my friend Holly works at. They have great music. We should go. Do you wanna go?”

Steve laughs. “Well, you see,” he starts, following your gaze over to his pile of records, “I would love to hangout, but I already have lots of music. Maybe we can do something -”

“More,” you say, forcing a smile onto your lips. “You need more.”

Steve chuckles at your assertiveness, although if he knew why you were asking him to hangout in this way, he probably wouldn’t find it too amusing. “Well... alright then. Record shopping with Y/N. Sounds like a blast. Wanna meet me back here at six?”

“Better make it eight.” Steve looks at you questioningly. “I have lots of sleep to catch up on.”

“Holy shit, Y/N. Holy shit.”

Later, when it’s nearly midnight and the two of you have just gotten back from sharing a milkshake at the local diner, you’re laying barefoot on Steve Harrington’s bed. He lays right beside you, shoulder pressed against yours, staring up at the ceiling in wide-eyed bewilderment.

The album you’re playing right now was one of the many albums you insisted that he purchase, much to his chagrin. However, now that you’re an hour deep into listening, you can tell that Steve has changed his mind.

“I always skip Bowie when he comes on the radio, but this? I didn’t know he made stuff like this.”

He inches his head onto the edge of his pillow - the one you claimed the minute you came in. You tilt your head towards him, laughing at his expression.

“Told you,” you say. “He’s incredible.”

The two of you fall back into your usual silence, listening to the sound of David Bowie’s soothing voice idle on Steve’s turntable. After flying through your Biology exam and taking a much-needed nap, you had awoken incredulous to the idea that you had somehow asked somebody like Steve Harrington on a date earlier that day.

That is, if angrily pounding on somebody’s door and close-to demanding them to buy music with you counts as a date.

“This is fun,” Steve says, clasping his hands together and resting them on his stomach.

You smile in surprise. “It is?”

“Yeah. I mean, I’ve never done this sort of thing with a girl.”

“What do you mean?” you ask, propping your head against your hand.

“Like… We’ve been laying here for almost an hour now, and the two of us have barely said anything. But it’s like we don’t have to because I feel like I already know so much about you, you know?”

You do. The minute you met Steve, his attractiveness and charm immediately stood out to you. But now that you’ve spent hours with the boy, cracking jokes in a record shop and playfully arguing over which milkshake flavor is the best, you feel like you know him better than anyone you’ve met since the beginning of the year.

“Yeah,” you whisper, toying with a loose thread on Steve’s comforter.

“How come we’ve never run into each other before?”

You shrug, unsure if his question is rhetorical or not. “I don’t know. I wish we had.”

Steve rolls onto his side, dark brown eyes burning holes into yours the same way they typically do. “Me too,” he says quietly.

Slowly but surely, Steve slips his hand into yours. You don’t say anything, just lean your head into the warmth of his shoulder as you wrap your fingers around his, wishing that you had confronted the obnoxious guy from Room 202 a long time ago.

#stranger things #stranger things imagine #steve harrington #steve harrington imagine #stranger things x reader #steve harrington x reader #joe keery #joe keery imagine #joe keery x reader #steve harrington x you #joe keery x you

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